The Start of Something
by TheOlympus
Summary: Dabi is a runaway and Izuku is trying to stay afloat while his life crumbles beneath him. Their paths cross and together they create something that they never thought possible. Something better.
1. Chapter I

**Note: ****tw for character death and slight blood. also swearing, but you wouldn't be here if you weren't okay with that. just. just check the tags please.**

All of his life, Izuku dreamed of becoming a hero. He watched any videos involving All Might religiously, kept a notebook analyzing heroes (for the future), and dreamed of becoming just like his idol.

To put it simply, Izuku wanted to be a hero.

"You should probably give it up. Normally, by age four, he would have already manifested one of his parent's Quirks, or some combination of the two. In the past, when the superpowers started showing up, the results of an early research study were published. It became common practice to see if the pinky toe was missing a joint or not. When parts of the body aren't used, they're deemed unnecessary. People who didn't have the joint were thought to be a newly evolved form. You can see by looking at this x-ray that Izuku has two joints. It's unusual to see that these days, but that means that he has no Quirk."

But you don't always get what you want.

Izuku found it very confusing how people could act like your closest friend one day, and the next you're someone that shouldn't be talked to. His mother told him that it's completely normal, and that it would all blow over in a couple of weeks after they realized how cool and nice he was, so Izuku believed her.

Six years later, and Izuku wasn't sure if he did anymore.

The teasing and isolation didn't end, despite what Izuku's mom had told him. It became a social rule that Izuku wasn't to be engaged with, a sort of custom that everyone followed. And, although he never became immune to the harsh words and jabs, he grew a sort of tolerance against them.

Of course, along with this acceptance, his desire to become a hero inevitably chipped away into a faraway thought. His collection of hero merchandise was packed away (most of it, anyways), and his will to attempt to make friends fizzled out after too many rejections; because, as he had learned through the years, nobody really wants to hang out with someone who's Quirkless.

Instead of watching hero fights and avidly taking notes, he picked up sketching as a pastime. His mother, Inko, noticed when he stopped bringing friends home, and made it a personal mission to take him out every weekend to get lunch together. It's on the way home from one of their outings that the plot in Izuku's story takes an unexpected turn.

* * *

Walking along the unpopulated street hand in hand, Inko promises to make his favorite for dinner, Katsudon.

"-and after dinner, we can do some baking. Sound good?" She looked down at him, anticipation a pretty plausible mask that hid something else entirely. Worry, and likely pity as well. Izuku wasn't paying near enough attention, however, to catch it. His mind instead drifted and swayed from meaningless thought to meaningless thought. His eyes followed suit, casually scanning the ground and shop entrances that they passed with little to no interest. His reply to his mother's question got caught in his throat when something caught his eye. He stopped to peer down the alley that had piqued his interest,

It was when Izuku saw red (too much red-) that he called his mom over in a panic,

"Mom! Someone's hurt!" He ran down the tight space, ignoring his mother's protests, and pointed at the body slumped against the side of the wall. When his mother catches up, she gasps in shock.

"Oh my goodness—Izuku back up—sir, are you alright?!" She offhandedly noted the oddly placed plague looking mask sitting by his side. Her curiosity is quickly brushed away when she notices the man is wearing a white dress shirt, the left half soaked in blood. Not quite unconscious yet, he looks up grimacing and manages to sneer at Inko.

"U-um, I'm Inko, I work as a nurse, is it okay if I look at the wound? Izuku, call an ambul—" she's in the middle of handing Izuku her phone when the man protests.

"NO! You fool, you can't call an ambulance," Inko looks at him in confusion, waiting for him to elaborate. "Look, just- ah-" he struggles to slide a phone out of his back pocket with the hand that isn't favoriing his side, and that's when Inko notices the bullet wound in his other arm.

"Oh stop it... here." Inko insists, grabbing his phone and ushering him into a sitting position. Upon handing it to him, he immediately dials a number and promptly drops the phone, going limp. Inko is about to tell Izuku to call an ambulance again when whoever he called picked up and started talking.

Inko picks the phone up off the ground to hear a handful of frenzied voices from the other end,

"Um, I don't know who this is but—oh man he's unconscious now. Um, I found this man injured in an alley, and he called this number before he passed out. He doesn't want me to take him to a hospital b-but he needs treatment-" The other man on the line ignores her worries and bluntly asks for a location. She complies and the man unceremoniously hangs up.

Upon the abrupt end of the call, Inko can't help but feel a little unnerved. She concludes that although she definitely doesn't want Izuku to have to witness such a gruesome injury, it would be best not to leave the man in such a critical state.

However, her worries on the matter of staying or leaving are calmed when two sleek black cars pull up only within a minute or two after the call. Several men clad in black suits pour out. They take the man off of the ground and carry him into one of the cars, immediately driving off. Inko senses that these men are dangerous, regretting her decision of staying put, and immediately places herself in front of Izuku protectively.

The last car's doors swing open and a single man steps out. He takes one curious look at them, flashes an unnerving grin, and pulls a gun from his waistband.

Inko goes cold.

"Sorry lads, Overhaul doesn't like loose ends." Inko freezes, but before the man can even aim or pull the trigger, Inko's maternal instincts come to life. She whips around and shoves Izuku towards the other end of the alley, shielding him with her body,

"IZUKU, RUN!" Izuku, frozen in shock, blinks back into reality and starts to stumble out of the alley. He turns back to make sure his mom is following when everything stops.

It's all in slow motion. The sound of a gun going off, and Inko's terrifyingly panicked expression as the bullet nails her in the back. Izuku's mind goes blank as he watches his mother crumple and slump to the ground.

And, and there's blood.

So, so, so much blood why isn't she moving and why can't Izuku breathe—

He can't move. Distantly he can hear his mother's words repeating in his head, quickly and urgently, screaming at him to go go go go GO—

So Izuku does.

With the sound of the gun still ringing in his ears, he springs to motion and sprints out of the alley as fast as he can. Turning a corner he hears footsteps echoing through the streets and another shot go off and yelling and it's all just so loud.

Izuku can't think straight anymore as he fumbles through twists and turns, backstreets and dumpsters, he doesn't even know where he is anymore, foreign street signs and shops names a blur as he runs. He doesn't know how long it's been either but he doesn't dare stop. His legs are numb and his head is pounding and his throat is dry and when he turns around to check if anyone is behind him, he slams into someone, knocking himself to the ground.

* * *

Dabi had been annoyed all damn week, and with good reason. He had finally gotten away from his shitty excuse of a father, but with his in the moment decisions and poor planning, he had been wandering around semi-aimlessly ever since. The only thing he regrets is leaving his siblings behind.

'They'll be fine. He doesn't care about them, he won't hurt them.'

Well, all except for Shoto—

In truth, he'd actually enjoyed the company of his youngest brother, until his Quirk came in. He'd always despised his father (duh), and was waiting for an opportunity to get out of that fucking house, but Shouto almost made it bearable. A deep self-loathing and rage hammered at him every time he imagined his little younger siblings knowing what he knew, feeling what he felt, but he just. Really had to get the fuck out of there.

His moment of brooding was interrupted when he was slammed into by a small body whilst scouring nearby shops for a half-decent cheap meal (his stolen budget wasn't exactly high, after all). He was about to cuss out whoever it was before continuing down the road, but he did a double take when he realized how much of a panic the kid was in.

He had a mess of pine-green hair, wearing an All Might T-shirt and worn-down red sneakers that were definitely way too big for him. The force of the impact had sent him to the ground, and a closer look told Dabi that he had dried tear streaks running down his cheeks and was panting like he'd just ran a marathon. After recovering from the fall he started babbling nonsense, taking big shaky gulps of air between each word, but Dabi only managed to catch the words 'mum', 'shot' and 'blood'.

Not the most fantastic combination, if you asked him.

"Woah, woah, chill kid, breathe," crouching down and grabbing his shoulders gently (and awkwardly), he tried to calm him down. "Shh, in and out, you're fine. Take your time."

After a minute the kid finally calmed down enough to get out a coherent (enough) sentence,

"P-please help! My-my mom she… s-she's..." He looked down at the ground and more tears started rushing down his face, his eyes frantically darting from side to side as his breathing quickened. Dabi, quite unsure on what the fuck he was supposed to do, desperately tried to make them stop; He never had anyone to help him through his outbursts, and his only real experiences were the few times he got to see his brother when he was having a meltdown, and even that was before he got his Quirk. Dabi settled for shushing him and soothingly carding his fingers through his forestry hair, allowing him to bury his head snugly into Dabi's stomach. He hoped it wasn't nearly as much as an uncomfortable situation for the kid as it was for him.

After a few minutes of sniffling and heavy breathing, the kids head meekly wiggled out of its position nuzzled against Dabi, and he scrubbed at his eyes weakly.

"I need h-help, my mom's really hurt. There was this guy and he was hurt real bad so we, we went to help him but," he took a moment to stifle an oncoming sob, "but t-then some creepy people came and they s-shot her and I ran and...and—"

His eyes opened wide, as if he was realizing something for the first time, "Oh g-god, I have to help her—"

Momentarily shocked after processing the words that the kid hiccuped out, Dabi realized that he had stopped speaking and shot up to run off again.

Dabi grabbed his wrist before he could bolt,

"Okay kid hold up, your mom sounds like she needs help, but I'm gonna call the cops first in case these 'creepy people' are still there, okay?" Dabi started dialing and motioned for the kid (he really needed to figure out his name) to lead the way. He was a little surprised when he hesitantly grabbed Dabi's hand before starting to speed walk back from where he came.

The walk felt short, especially since most of it consisted of a conversation with the police over the phone which ended up being pointless because 'no I don't know the location or how bad the injuries are' and 'I'm sorry but are you telling me to fucking ask this little kid where his mom was shot?'. He would call back when they got there.

After he hung up, the rest of the walk was for the most part quiet, save for the kids' quiet sniffles and small hiccups. Dabi didn't really like the tension in the air, as suffocating as it was, but it wasn't like he could start up some small talk, could he? 'hey kid, I know your mom just got shot, but what's your favorite ice cream flavor, huh?'

He stayed quiet.

When they reached the scene, Dabi felt his heart clench, and he could feel the small body that was holding onto him go stiff. He saw a patch of mostly-dried blood, presumably left by the injured man who was now nowhere in sight, and a trail of fresh blood leading to a growing puddle surrounding a body propped up against a wall. He was used to cleaning his own minor wounds and tending to bruises, but this was nothing either of them should be seeing.

Dabi moved to cover the now trembling child's eyes, only to see that his head was firmly lodged into his side, his small hands clutching his shirt like a life-line. He showed no evidence of crying, which was somehow infinitely worse than when he was.

He got out his phone and candidly informed the new, less asshole-ish operator on what happened, stuttering out their address as quickly as possible; as if the faster he spoke the less real it would be for the small figure next to him. Dabi pockets his phone, and for a brief moment, all is still and placid; as if the air itself is as fragile as china.

It doesn't take long, however, for the kid to finally break. He bounds over to the woman leaning up against the wall, Dabi following close behind. A quick once over tells Dabi that she had indeed taken a bullet, specifically to the back, and was heavily bleeding through her thin T-shirt. She seemed unconscious, or worse—and although Dabi was about the farthest thing away from a religious person, he prayed to whatever god that could be listening that it wasn't the latter. The kid was already in hysterics again, shaking and pleading and sobbing and just generally doing everything that Dabi does not want to see a little kid do.

He certainly did not have the heart to pull him away, not when this might be the last time he gets to sees his mother.

Sirens can be heard in the distance, and when the ambulance itself shows up—its red and blue lights casting a veil of grimness onto everything nearby—Dabi feels a brutal detachment settle in. He hardly tries to stop it, and welcomes the newfound numbness with open arms.

Paramedics rush in and Dabi has to physically tug the child out of the way. He's screaming and crying and yelling and scratching and Dabi tries to feel as little of nothing as he can when the paramedics cart away his unnaturally pale mother into the ambulance.

Dabi hadn't even realized police had shown up until an officer tapped him on the shoulder, politely asking them if they needed a ride to the hospital. As weary as he was with police, being a runaway, he couldn't imagine leaving the kid all alone after what he (what they both) had seen.

After a car ride full of sniffles, tears, and snot, they arrived at the hospital and were immediately told to sit in the waiting room. Inko had been immediately brought into surgery.

People shot them concerned, startled, and even annoyed looks, and it was all Dabi could do to stay by the kids' side instead of yelling and throwing punches because how fucking dare they—

The doctors had kindly left them to grieve a moment (it was the least they could do, really), and once the kid had been somewhat soothed back down again for what must've been the fifth time that day, a nurse cautiously approached them, asking about any relatives that he could stay with.

And, for a second, Dabi thought about telling them the truth. He thought about telling them that he was just bystander caught in the storm. He thought about leaving the kid to be dealt out to whoever social services sought fit. He thought about exiting the hospital and never looking back.

Then he saw the kids eyes. He was terrified. He was miserable. He was grieving beyond anything a kid as young as he was should have to bear.

Fuck it.

"He's my little brother. Can we please go home for the night and sort things out tomorrow?" He desperately hoped she bought the lie, and tensed when her eyes squinted in slight suspicion, darting between the two. Dabi knew that if she asked for anything; a number, who their legal guardians are, contact information, hell, even just his fucking name, that they would be screwed. They didn't even look slightly related, Dabi's own red hair heavily contrasting against the younger's own dark green. The kid said nothing, simply inching closer to Dabi, clinging onto his torso tighter.

To both of their relief, the nurse's eyes softened as she sighed and nodded kindly. She handed Dabi a card and told him something involving the hospitals opening time and how she understood how difficult a situation like this could be and that they could take all the time that they needed (but Dabi wasn't really listening).

He thanked her, trying to sound as sincere as possible when in reality there was nothing real in his voice but an urge to end the conversation. She smiled softly before promptly leaving to tend to another patient across the room.

They wasted no time.

Dabi sat up before crouching down so that the child could ride on his back (he didn't think that he would have the energy to walk). The kid quickly complied, hopping on eagerly without so much as a word, and the two skirted out of the hospital and down the street before anyone could stop them.

Dabi could feel the way that the kid had all but melted into him, his shallow breaths cool against the back of his neck. It made complete sense that he would be exhausted, and Dabi was frankly surprised that he hadn't dozed off long before now.

A couple of minutes passed in near silence before it dawned on him that he really hadn't checked if the kid actually had any family he could go home with, and that he could be kidnapping a child from a very worried family.

Shit.

He nudged the kid slightly to wake him up, trying to be as gentle as possible. When he heard a faint monotone hum, he took it as an okay to continue,

"Hey, kid, you don't like, actually have anybody to go home with, do you? Like a Dad or Aunt or some shit." the second the words escaped his mouth, he realized that he had phrased them in about the worst way possible. And he had also sweared. In front of a kid.

Fan-fucking-tastic.

"No." he mumbled into Dabi's neck, seeming not to notice how rude the question was. Either that or he was just too tired to care. Probably both.

Well alright then. Problem solved.

About five minutes into their walk, Dabi realized he actually had no idea where this kid lived. Tapping his thigh to gain his attention again, he softly asked where his address was, heavily relieved that he recognized the apartment building and it wasn't more than a five-minute walk. Because as fit as Dabi was, with his marvelous six pack and all (ha), he had to admit that the days' events had thoroughly drained him to the point that he couldn't wait to crash into a bed and not wake up for days.

His brows furrowed thinking over how he went from scrounging for cheap food, to carrying home a newly orphaned kid who couldn't be older than a junior high student, in only a few hours.

He snapped out of his daze with a slight shake of his head. Dabi would save thoughts like those for tomorrow, when he could better deal with them.

He scaled the stairs of the apartment building, going down a hall and stopping at the given room number. Dabi crouched slowly, making sure his back stayed straight as to not jostle the kid as he nabbed the spare key from under the welcome mat. It was exactly where he had said it would be (Dabi honestly had no idea how these people hadn't gotten robbed with the ingenious hiding spot).

Stepping through the threshold, he immediately felt a wave of warmth hit him. The living space was very well-heated, and the comfort only added to his growing desire to pass out then and there. He fought the urge though, and shifted the weight of the small body on him so that he wouldn't slip off.

Dabi shut the front door with his foot, albeit a bit louder than he intended, and meandered into the hallway to try to find the kid's bedroom. Choosing to inspect the door closest to him first, he twisted the knob (noting how it creaked loudly in response) and entered, surprised at what he saw. It looked like a room that would belong to a child, with toys and bubble lettering and a very small bed, but he also noticed how bare the room was, aside from a few art pieces on the wall that were actually pretty good for such a little kid.

He gently laid him on the bed, trying to avoid stirring him as much as possible. His expression was peaceful and devoid of any negative emotion (save for the dried tear stains). If Dabi hadn't known about what he had gone through he would have assumed that the kid was completely fine. He looked as normal as any kid should.

Except Dabi did know what had happened.

So he knew that he wasn't fine.

Originally, Dabi had planned on finding another bed to sleep on so that the kid wouldn't have to wake next to an instant reminder of what had happened (and there was also the fact that he was 17, and the kid was like, what, 8? He didn't want to act like a creep). However, the thought of sleeping in the bed of the kids' deceased mom was both unsettling and probably very disrespectful, so he canceled that out.

Sleeping on the floor, although not the worst idea, was probably not very smart either; because as much as he was used to the unwelcome and awkward pain from sleeping on a hard surface, it wouldn't be the best way to tackle tomorrow. And dealing with tomorrow was going to be really fucking hard.

In the end, thinking became too much labor, and Dabi had half-consciously crashed onto the kids' bed and crawled under the covers in exhausted defeat. Besides, this child had used him as a living tissue about six times that day, so that must mean something in the not-being-a-complete-stranger-and-therefore-not-being-a-creep book.

He rolled over onto his side, making sure to keep a moderate distance between his body and the kids, and shut his eyes.

Somewhere very far away in his mind he registered that he was hungry, and probably dehydrated as well, but you know what? He could deal with all of that unwanted shit tomorrow

And with that thought, Dabi finally let sleep take him.


	2. Chapter II

Izuku woke up gradually.

It was the kind of morning where you already woke up a while ago, but your brain decided in advance it wasn't ready yet, so you continue dreaming anyway.

And Izuku was having a really good dream, too. It had All Might in it, and they were fighting villains together. Izuku was doing really well and was totally winning with his awesome quirk (it was the type of dream where he never consciously became aware of what that quirk was, but he was winning and the villains were losing so it didn't matter too much).

The movements and breeze against his face felt all too real and exciting, and Izuku couldn't help but smile, nuzzling further into his cocoon.

There was a weight, however, that stopped him from pulling his blanket closer.

Izuku relaxed when he acknowledged that his Mom must've come into his room at some point during the night to comfort him from a night-terror. Izuku never remembered them, which was apparently normal, but his Mom could relay with scary detail the way that he would kick and scream and cry. There was a point, several years ago, when she had stopped telling him when they happened, but Izuku always knew anyways because she'd be there next to him in the morning.

He pulled stubbornly at the covers with the knowledge that his mom was a well-known blanket hoarder, and fell comfortably back into the dream before he knew it.

The extremely rude awakening of the alarm clock sounding a few seconds later startled Izuku back to full consciousness. He grumbled to himself and moved to get up to set the clock to snooze, as angry at an inanimate object as one could be, when something caught his eye.

The shape of the body under the blankets wasn't right.

It was lean and tall, covered way too much bed, and was not Izuku's Mom.

It wasn't.

It-

Oh.

Oh.

Numbness and a pause. The alarm beeped twice a second. The world was slow.

He crouched to the ground and covered his face before feeling prickly and tumbling over and curling up into a tight ball on the ground.

Izuku felt sick, but he also felt an incredible desire not to move, so he stayed there for a while, letting the alarm sing its song forever in the background while the world collapsed around him.

BEEP.

BEEP.

Go.

BEEP.

BEEP.

Run.

BEEP.

BEEP.

BANG!

BEEP—

Izuku ran for the bathroom and threw up into the tub.

His back arched as he retched in between hiccuping sobs that racked his entire being and shook him as he cried as hard as his body would physically allow.

His arms felt as thin as twigs supporting a mountain (he was convinced that they would break). He collapsed in on himself, unable to keep his body upright, and hit his chin on the side of the bath which made him bite his tongue. He cried harder.

He didn't want to do this. He wanted to go back. He _really really really_ didn't want to do this so please let him go back she was there yesterday why couldn't she be here today he didn't want this _he didn't want this he didn't want this_—

He would never, ever see her again. Ever. She wouldn't be there to wake him up in the morning. He would never hear her. They would never see another movie.

"-and after dinner, we can do some baking! Sound good?"

Izuku's body felt completely hollow. Nothing felt real or permanent except for the overwhelming thoughts that hurt worse than any physical pain he'd ever endured. The realization of this made him start sobbing again (he had never really stopped).

The ground was cold, really cold, and Izuku felt the weirdest urge to allow it to swallow him whole and just stay there forever and never have to think, or breathe, or do anything ever again—

A hand rested on his shoulder.

Izuku didn't flinch, but he didn't want it to come closer. It wasn't his Mom, and he felt like turning to face it would make it that much more real and _who does he think he is, trying to replace_—

He comes closer anyways.

"—have to breathe, okay just, you need—"

W-why couldn't he hear it? Was he dying? He must be dying. Nothing else could hurt this bad. He clawed at his throat, trying to take in air, to tear away whatever must be choking him, and something pulled his hands back down and _oh god oh god oh god why why why stopitithurtsIneedtobreatheIi'mdyingstopstopstop_!

"God, okay seriously, kid, you have to calm down— in and out, breathe with me, uh, just, yeah, yeah, like that, that's a lot better, you're okay, you're in your bathroom and you're okay, alright? Okay…okay good, good, that's great. You're doing great," words cut through the eerie soupy fog in his brain, and he realized that he might actually not be dying, and that the words might be right. He could feel a shaggy rug with his fingers. He could hear a, a faucet? Yeah, he could hear water coming from somewhere and he could see….

The same guy from yesterday, with the spiky red hair; the one he'd bumped into—_The one that had taken him to the hospital after his mom got—_

Huh. So that's where the words came from.

Suddenly, a paper cup of water was forced into his line of vision.

"Here's some water. You should, uh, probably drink it. 'Cuz, you know, it might be good for you after all….t-that," he stuttered, something that somehow seemed out place with his usual demeanor. How Izuku knew this was beyond him. He continued with more confidence, "It's tap, so it's not too good but I didn't want to leave you when you were freaking out so I used the bathroom sink. If that's okay." he seemed unsure and very out of his element.

Izuku took the water, despite being relatively sure that he would throw it right back up (can you throw up water?).

He also took it because he was too drained and...vacant, to argue. So he swallowed the water from the dixie cup quickly, ignoring the nausea that came with it.

He handed the now empty cup back to the guy, who took and simply set it down on the ground.

There were a few seconds of silence that on any other day Izuku would have deemed awkward, but right now he just felt empty and cold. That or absolutely miserable. He didn't like either of the two very much.

The stranger cleared his throat and shifted, before peering back at Izuku questionably. Or concerningly. Izuku was only good at reading his Mom's expressions, not some stranger's.

Annd he was crying again.

He couldn't help it. Izuku had always been called a crybaby (it was one of the more common 'nicknames' his schoolmates gave him besides Quirkless). Whenever he felt sad, or emotional in any way, we would cry. It was basically second-nature, and it wasn't a trait he particularly liked about himself. But it couldn't be helped.

Especially when every thought brought him back to his Mom.

And now he was sobbing.

"You know what? I don't think I ever told you my name, did I? You never really told me yours either, but I can give you a pass this one time."

And, somehow, the way that he said it so blatantly, as if this were any other normal situation, triggered Izuku to giggle. It was more sad that bubbly, and blended into the sobs, but it was there, nonetheless.

"I'm—" he froze mid-word. Izuku stopped giggling, and the rare high dissipated.

He seemed to be thinking something over, before only a moment later coming out of his weird daze and finishing his thought.

"I'm Dabi." he said as a finality. And something was off about the way he said it, but Izuku didn't consider mulling it over. Thinking clearly wasn't his forté today.

There was another break in the conversation, and 'Dabi' was looking at him like he expected him to say something. "I've literally been calling you 'kid' this entire time, and I'm pretty sure that's not your name, so, help me out here?" he articulated, gesturing at him accordingly.

Right. When someone tells you their name, you're supposed to say yours back.

"Izuku Midoriya." he wasn't entirely sure why he'd said his last name, considering how Dabi hadn't said his, but whatever.

This time the pause lasted long enough for even Izuku to feel a bit uncomfortable, but he didn't do or say anything to break it. He was just, really, really sad. And tired. A sad-tired combo that made him want to stop doing. Just stop doing as a whole, really.

"I'm just going to cut to the chase," whatever was in his voice as an attempt at lightening the mood earlier was gone now, and he spoke bluntly. "We can't stay here,"

He looked like he expected some reaction, and when he didn't get one, he continued.

"Eventually, they'll come and check this place out, and when they do, I don't want to be here-"

"So are you on the run from the police, or what?" he spat. Izuku surprised himself with his words and newfound malice against the person sitting across from him, but things weren't adding up.

Why was he here with this guy, someone who could easily be a _villain_, and not with someone who actually knows what to do with him? Why did Izuku come with him? Was he being kidnapped? If he really wanted to, could he leave? Or would he be stopped?

"Uh. Sort of. It's complicated, but I didn't like, kill anybody or anything. It's, it's just... complicated. Yeah. Let's just say that," he stood up and offered a hand to Izuku, who swatted it away with a glare (why was he so angry all of a sudden—?).

Predicting Izuku's mindset, Dabi sighed, and then spoke up, "I don't want you to think I'm stealing you or something. You can leave at any time, just say the word," his stare somehow softened midway through the sentence, and his tense and almost defensive posture melted.

Did Izuku want to leave?

Of course.

He didn't want whatever this was to be his life. He didn't want to live with a criminal. Just the thought alone, as a random hypothetical situation, would bring (_would've brought_) his mom to hysterics.

But.

But at the same time...

Izuku didn't want to do anything.

He didn't want to move on. He didn't want to move forward in time, growing up with another family, a replacement. That was the last thing that he wanted to do.

Maybe...maybe if he stayed with Dabi, it would be different.

He wouldn't replace his Mom, he would, he would just be someone new. _Not a replacement_ , but a temporary, guardian…

He said he could leave any time, didn't he?

Yeah.

Yeah, that's what he'll do.

He'll stay and when he wants to leave, he'll leave.

Okay.

"Okay."

He stood up on his own, and immediately began shaking. Izuku's world spun and tilted before he felt hands latch onto his shoulders to anchor him.

Izuku heard someone talking, but it sounded really far away, so he gave up straining to hear the words.

Then the hands let go of his shoulder.

Izuku had already sat back down, so he didn't fall or anything, but something about the reassuring presence leaving made Izuku feel scared and panicked so he flailed and reached out and _please don't leave me here please_—

"—I said I'm going to make breakfast, because I'm hungry, and you look like you're about to pass out. Do you want to stay here, or come with me? You didn't say anything last time so I thought you wanted some time alone but—"

Izuku found his arm and yanked, pulling it closer,

"But...I guess not. I'm just going to pick you up, if that's okay? I need some confirmation here because it's a little hard to tell what you want when you won't say anything,"

Izuku nodded sullenly, hugging the arm tighter and frowning into the shirt sleeve.

"I'll take that as a yes, then."

He bent down and tenderly wrapped his arm under Izuku's legs and upper back, hauling him off the ground and into his arms bridal style. He started to stroll towards the kitchen.

"Sidenote, we both stink. Do you know how to uh, wash yourself…" he ended that thought with another one, "wait, how old even are you?"

It was questions like these that Izuku was specifically told by his Mom not to answer, but Izuku would have to get used to it.

Izuku was glad his head was buried in the crook of Dabi's arm, because he was sure he had already seen him cry enough that day (and Izuku could conclude that Dabi really did smell).

"Ten."

"Then you've showered before, right? You know how to?"

Izuku did in fact know how to shower, but he really, really didn't want Dabi to leave him in the bathroom alone.

He shook his head.

Izuku had no idea where this newfound clinginess came from, but thinking about it made him sad, so he didn't.

"Oh. Alrighty then, we, we'll deal with that later," he mused. It didn't take a genius to draw the conclusion that he was uncomfortable with the idea of helping him shower, but Izuku couldn't help it. He needed to be around someone. He trembled at the idea of being left alone again.

* * *

Breakfast, apparently, consisted of dry cereal (they were out of milk) and three-day-old microwaved white rice, but he didn't mind.

Izuku couldn't taste the food anyway.

Eating was a joyless task. The rice was bland and stale, and the cereal scraped the roof of his mouth raw.

Dabi moved around the house, sorting through cabinets and drawers, grabbing some stuff and leaving others. Izuku couldn't bring himself to care about anything other than the tightness he felt in his chest when Dabi disappeared into a room, if only for a few moments. He didn't mind that the act was basically robbery. There was nobody to steal from, after all.

Izuku noted that for someone who had minutes before complained about hunger, Dabi wasn't eating anything. He didn't dwell on it.

Memories from countless breakfasts from before played out in front of him. However, much like the food, it only had the texture. The flavor was gone.

How could it be that hardly 24 hours ago she was _right here_? That they were talking casually, blissfully unaware.

Maybe if he hadn't agreed to go out to dinner that night—

Maybe if he hadn't looked down that alley—

Maybe if he had jumped in front of her instead of running away like the Deku that he was—

Then maybe.

Maybe she would still be alive.

Izuku felt a colossal wave of nausea hit him, so he stood up and tried to dart to the bathroom again but this time the feeling was too sudden, and Izuku's reaction time too slow.

He didn't make it.

The bile stung all the way up and out, and tasted grossly bitter. The sickening noise of it hitting the ground made Izuku dry heave (there was nothing left in his stomach to hurl) and tears formed in his eyes from the pain.

He stood there, quivering and coughing and rubbing tears from his eyes. The top of his mouth, which was already torn up from the cereal, was hurting especially bad. That and his tongue, which he'd bitten down on earlier.

Izuku could see Dabi rushing urgently over, which somehow made him go from sniveling to hiccup-crying all over again.

"Fuck- I mean, uh-shit-wait." He gently coaxes Izuku away from the puddle of vomit and back to the table. After the pain came the guilt and shame of causing such a mess.

Izuku is about to offer to clean it up when he sees the concerning look Dabi's wearing.

"Wow, um hey it's ok, but are you like sick sick, or is this just because-because of, um…"

When Izuku promptly fell into another fit of involuntary tears, he could practically feel the regret radiating off of Dabi from the insensitive question.

Izuku wanted to apologize (for what he isn't completely sure. Probably a lot of things) and assure him that it's okay, but his arms, in contrast to earlier, now felt heavy. The best way to describe the feeling was if you took the tiredness out of exhaustion, and that didn't even make sense, did it? Oh well.

"Um. Do you remember what I told you earlier about how we both smell really, really bad?" Dabi asked bluntly, acting as a human barrier separating Izuku from the spot of throw-up. He took Izuku's lack of response as a confirmation (he thought the question was rhetorical, anyways),

"Well. Yea. We do. Here's the deal, I'm going to finishing gathering stuff up, and you're going to take a bath. You can finish your food first, if you want—"

Izuku pushed away his food.

"or not. That's okay too, I guess. I'm going to start up the bath, and you can wait here," he turned to leave, presumably to fill the bathtub, and Izuku immediately felt scared again. Except he didn't want Dabi to think he was a baby, and didn't want to have to be treated like one. He could go an entire day home alone before, so he could handle a couple minutes alone in a different room.

Nothing's changed.

A minute that felt way longer than a minute passed with the itch of needing to be near someone growing larger and larger by the second. The urge was a pressure that chipped and dug at his skull. It made him twitch and shiver, and he randomly began feeling like breaking down, when all of a sudden—

Izuku heard the bathtubs knob squeak followed by rushing water. Had it only been a minute? Less?

He couldn't take it any longer.

Every step closer to the bathroom made the build-up recede a little more, and when Dabi was in sight it had completely dissipated (pathetic, so pathetic)

Dabi was in the process of putting cleaning supplies back into the space below the sink, a strong aroma of vomit and putrid chemicals wafting off of him, when Izuku arrived.

"I just started it up. It should only be a few more minutes until it's full enough. Even if you haven't done this before on your own I refuse to believe you've never taken a bath in your life, so uh," he grabbed two bottles in one hand by their nozzles, and nabbed a soap bar with his other hand.

"The one that says 'shampoo' cleans your hair, and the 'conditioner' one like. Uh. Actually, I'm not really sure. But, you use both of them anyways, shampoo first and then conditioner, in your hair, and then soap is for your skin. Got it?"

Izuku wished that Dabi could understand that he didn't want to be left on his own without having to say it outright, but he wasn't leaving Izuku much of a choice. He shook his head meekly.

"You want me to explain it again? Because, you know it's okay if—"

"Can't you just shower with me," Izuku asked quietly, shamefully. His mom used to do that when he was really little, and he'd always assumed she'd stopped because she was a girl and he was a boy. But Dabi was a boy, right? So, maybe it would be okay and not weird to ask?

Apparently not.

The second Dabi registered the question, his cheeks reddened and he shook his hands around a bit in front of him, extremely flustered by the question.

"NO! No, uh nope. That is not an option, kid. Sorry, but uh. No."

Izuku looked down and wrung his fingers, feeling a renewed sense of embarrassment. He hadn't meant to make things worse. He just really didn't want to be alone. If one a minute or two of him being in the other room freaked Izuku out, what would happen when the door was closed? He wouldn't be able to hear him moving around, and, and _if something happened_ ? Then what? Izuku wouldn't know until he came out, and then it would be too late, and, and—

Oh jeez—

The constricting feeling in his neck came back and he felt itchy and hot and—

"Okokokay kid, listen to me, please. I'll tell you what," he still seemed ruffled from Izuku's earlier question, but had collected himself enough to finish the thought. "I can leave for a second while you get in and stay on the other side of the shower curtain while you're in there. And then leave again while you get out and get dressed. I'll never be further than the hallway, and if you need anything, just call. I promise I'll answer. Sound good?"

Izuku felt the constricting feeling go away, but the heat in his face and the itchy feeling didn't' fully dissipate. He gulped and nodded nonetheless, wiping away tears and snot and feeling every bit like the little kid that he was. This wasn't helping, crying wasn't helping anything. He was being so needy and dependent, and it was probably annoying Dabi a lot. He should tell him that it was okay, and that he didn't need to stay. He had better things to be doing, after all.

Izuku didn't tell him that. He stayed quiet.

And perhaps, it was the staying quiet that made the rest of the day so bleak.

"Okay then." Dabi leaned over and turned the faucet off, deciding that the water was high enough, and shut the door on his way out, saying that he was grabbing him some extra clothes and would ask before coming back in.

Dabi came back in time for Izuku to be situated in the bath, and got comfortable on the closed toilet seat, telling Izuku that if he needed anything to just ask.

Turns out Izuku felt too ashamed to say much of anything the entire time, and only a few words were exchanged. Even then, it was just Dabi checking in and making sure he hadn't silently drowned.

Strangely enough, Izuku felt even more dazed and floaty after the tub than before. Maybe it was because he'd cried a lot to himself during it. Not the loud kind of crying, but the kind where you don't physically react as tears simply fall down your face. They dripped into the water, he washed his face, and nobody ever had to know. It was refreshing, but he still felt more floaty than before. Weird.

It was because of this new and weird floatiness that Izuku didn't remember much of the rest of the day. He quietly asked Dabi to leave while he got dressed and the rest after was a blur. It didn't feel nice and calm, but it didn't feel sad either. It didn't feel much of anything, actually. Dull, floaty nothingness.

He barely remembered dryly agreeing to sit outside the bathroom door while Dabi took a quick shower. Or following Dabi like a lost dog while he packed up some necessities.

He could, however, recall being outside of his own room (why, he couldn't tell you) with Dabi talking to him. He watched his mouth move, but didn't truly hear anything.

Izuku did become more focused, however, when he saw Dabi grab a large backpack and a small grocery bag off the ground. He slung the former over his shoulder, and tossed Izuku the bag.

"I recommend that you pick out anything that you want to bring with you and put it in there," seeing Izuku nod, he turned around and began walking away, presumably to pack a bit more. He turned around and added, "And don't take too much, it's a bit of a long walk," not unkindly, before continuing down the hallway, leaving Izuku alone.

He felt an upcoming rise of fear, but forced it down. He couldn't the stop itchiness though.

His messy comforter still sat disturbed in his bed, reminding him of how his mother always reminded him to make it every morning. A sharp stab of sickness hit his stomach when he realized she wasn't here to tell him off for leaving things so messy.

Izuku kinda just sat there a while, listening to the sounds of Dabi rummaging through what was once his home to calm the racing in his heart, before reluctantly starting to pack up his belongings.

He tried to ignore the feeling of something missing, something just outside of his reach, his vision. A black hole eating away at the inside of his stomach. Maybe if he ignored it, it would go away.

**It didn't.**

**See you next week! Cheers! **


	3. The start of something III

**OKAY THE CHAPTER NAME MAKES IT SOUND LIKE THEY FUCK OR SOMETHING but no it's alright they just talk ok their relationship is and will always remain platonic, just want to clarify that right off the bat [also there isn't any underage drinking].**

It didn't take too long for the kid to finish loading up his stuff (which was for the better, because Dabi had been skittish with worry all morning). He knew that they had four days, a week tops, before the authorities got impatient enough to come knocking at their door.

Dabi didn't plan on being there to answer it.

After that would come the missing posters, and the rave about the abducted child who was taken advantage of after his mother was killed. That would last for a bit, before it died down and the media would move on to it's next target. They would have to be careful though, while people were still scanning the streets for the boy with the bushy dark hair, freckles, and red sneakers that they saw in the paper.

He wanted to be a move ahead of everyone else. Hence leaving on the first morning after.

And sure , maybe it was just paranoia getting the best of him wanting to get out so soon, but better safe than sorry, right? Besides, the weight of illegally adopting a child still hadn't taken full effect yet, and Dabi was riding that wave of ignorance for as long as he could. Being able to adjust to a new environment before the shitstorm rather than after was the closet Dabi would ever get to being productive, after all.

It was all he could do to get a few bites of apple in between packing and the kids' (Izuku was his name, right?) freak-outs. So he was still really, really hungry. And pissy as well, probably. The kid Izuku would've been all set and good to go food-wise if it hadn't been for the unfortunate upchuck of everything in his stomach.

Although Dabi had originally tried to convince himself otherwise, it would be stupid leaving the mess for the first-responders, and later the press, to find. Any sort of 'evidence' could prolong the searches and make the ordeal bigger, and by extension, longer. No thank you.

Dabi had to walk slowly so that Midoriya could keep up.

It wasn't that he was slow or anything, but he was basically dragging his feet behind him. Purposeful or not, Dabi elected to say nothing. The kid's entire posture read deflated, and his red-rimmed eyes stared vacantly ahead, unseeing.

He noticed how Izuku's apathy progressively got replaced by nervousness the further they went away from the house. He absent-mindedly scratched at his pants, his eyes scanned restively in front of him, and his pace quickened. It reminded him of Shoto, once upon a time.

Dabi cleared his throat and offered his hand as an open comfort, which Izuku took (small victories) only to see his eyes widen upon apparently realizing how warm it was. Noticing this, the older chuckled and explained it was his Quirk, saying nothing more to elaborate. It was difficult keeping his body temperature down when he was this on edge, and he was relieved that he hadn't accidentally burnt the kid. That would definitely be a step in the wrong direction.

He was pleasantly surprised that Izuku hadn't asked where they were going or the infamous 'are we there yet?' question, and felt an odd swell of pride that the kid put so much trust in him so soon (he chose to believe it was trust and not fear or shock, because Dabi needed a win right about now). However, he still had an anxious look on his face, and it only got worse when they traversed into the 'bad' part of town, the grip on his hand tightening all the while. Dabi squeezed back in what he hoped was a reassuring gesture.

After that, it didn't take too long for them to reach their destination, and Dabi tried to ignore the kids' confusion and then disappointment when they stopped in front of a half-haphazardly boarded up subway entrance.

Dabi easily tore the boards off of the entrance-way and set them on the ground. The task was borderline effortless due to the fact that he had earlier positioned them to look secure so that people stayed away (he doesn't mention how difficult and labor-intensive it was when originally removing them nail by nail only a week ago).

Stepping into the threshold, Dabi pulls out a flashlight he nabbed from the Midoriya house and flicks it on, illuminating the path down the stairs. The kid hugged his side, and Dabi honestly couldn't blame him. It looked like a scene out of a goddamn horror movie, after all.

They trekked down the steps and further into the station, their footsteps echoing curiously in all directions. Otherwise, not a sound was made.

Continuing downward for a couple more minutes, Dabi finally veered off to the side to face an almost hidden doorway that appeared out of nowhere. Naturally Izuku, startled and unsuspecting of such a casual stop, stumbled. He steadied the kid before mentally reprimanding himself for not giving a warning.

Dabi honestly couldn't fathom what the fuck kind of architect would put a door smack dab in the middle of a stairwell, but he wasn't exactly complaining. Hell, even finding the door had been a stroke of luck. The reflection of his Quirk against the knob had caught his eye, and a quick investigation told Dabi that he had struck gold (metaphorically speaking, of course. The place was an actual dump.)

The opening lead into a low-ceilinged hallway that forked into two more doorless rooms. They stopped so that Dabi could speak,

"The one on the left is a bathroom, water actually still works down here," how, you ask? Dabi didn't have a clue. He'd been just as surprised when he turned on a faucet, expecting nothing, only to see brownish water come flowing out. Gross, and certainly undrinkable, but surprising nonetheless. It would work for the toilet, at least.

"No luck on the power though. But no worries, I have like, tons of emergency lamps and a pretty big battery supply. The whole place is pretty nasty right now since I don't spend much time down here other than to sleep on..." opening the second door, Dabi gestured to his lovely 'room' and his high quality king-sized bed. "My lovely."

Dabi put a sarcastically smug look on his face, his gesture oozing with fake pride as he presented the ratty thing fondly. Izuku actually, genuinely snorted, staring at the pullout couch that had definitely seen better days.

"That thing looks like it belongs on Dagobah beach." Dabi mocked a shocked gasp at that, as though thoroughly offended.

"Hey, you have it too good. Where I come from, this is top luxury, I swear," the kids' next noise was a held-back chuckle, as if he wasn't sure if Dabi was kidding or not.

"That was a joke, by the way," he added, trying to keep the kid from feeling bad, and instantly regretted it when the mood was extinguished. Great, now he'd made it awkward.

Another one of those cursed pauses was casted, in which Dabi noticed the way that the kid rocked on the back of his heels and wrung his fingers together awkwardly. Back at home it was never his job to start the conversation back up, as talkative as his immediately younger brother and sister often were, so he guessed he would have to work on that if he wanted a chance at putting an end to the dreaded breaks.

So, you can imagine how surprising it was when the kid was the first to end the silence.

"Can we start setting up the lamps? I-it's really dark, and cold in here…"

The question was so reluctantly said that Dabi wouldn't have been surprised if he was prepared to be shot down.

"Yeah. Yeah, sure,"'

Shit.

The kid had also mentioned that he was cold, right? It was easy to forget how quickly others could get cold when Dabi was capable of basically managing his own body heat. Izuku must be freezing. It was almost winter, and Dabi could only imagine how frigid it was in such a dark and damp place.

And on top of all that, he was still wearing the same fucking T-shirt he had on yesterday, and could see his breath in front of him for christs sake. First day on the job and he'd probably already given this poor kid frostbite.

He set the luggage he'd been carrying on the floor and ignited a small flame in the palm of his hand. Concentrating his Quirk into one specific area was difficult, and the lick quivered and danced a bit, but otherwise worked fine as a makeshift torch.

Dabi was just about to start rummaging through his stuff when he caught a glimpse of the kid.

He stared in awe, the loss in his eyes replaced by the serendipitous glow that reflected it's blue light against Izuku's face. It left a warm feeling in Dabi's chest, seeing so much sheer wonder and amazement in his gaze. He seemed utterly hypnotized.

For a second, while the blue of the light peppered the kid's hair, dying it blue, everything felt like it would be okay. Dabi liked the feeling a lot.

The moment passed slowly; carefully. Like water seeping out of the gaps of one's hand. It left, as moments do, and there they were: In an abandoned subway station in the dark, staring at a light.

"I'm going to start setting up the lamps. We can unpack everything tomorrow." Dabi huffs in a last-ditch attempt to avoid yet another oncoming dreaded silence. He handed Izuku the flashlight so that he wasn't left in the darkness while Dabi was setting up, and sat down to search through the bag for batteries and a blanket.

Using his small fire as a light-source, Dabi sorted through the assortment of crap and eventually found the six Double A Battery packs he'd snagged from a nearby drug store and the screwdriver he took with him from home. The blanket was near the top of the pile so he simply flung it at the kid, who gratefully wrapped it around his shivering body. He tore the batteries out of their cardboard packing, tossing the trash on the floor to be dealt with in the morning, before making his way to the closest lamp.

One by one, Dabi started up the lamps (he had twelve total) and soon found out that not every single lamp needed Double A batteries. So he had nine lamps now. Which was just fine with him anyways.

He had just finished screwing on the battery cartridge lid onto the last light when he walked back over to where the kid was still sitting, pressing the flashlight directly into the palm of his hand, creating a weird red fleshy look on the other side; he seemed to be in a daze. He glanced up, however, when Dabi approached him, and Izuku looked tired. Like, tired and cold and hungry because jesus he hadn't fed him, like, at all the entire day. And what was it, like, nine? He went a whole day without any food? And wasn't complaining? Did he even notice, through his little fog? And he was still wearing the same clothes he had on almost two days ago when his mom died? Dabi was fucking nailing this.

"You're hungry, right? And cold? I can get you something with long sleeves and something to eat, you know. You just have to ask—"

"Mmmno," the kid slurred. His weight was being supported by the arm of the couch, and his eyes closed every few seconds before he had to force them open again.

"Are you sure? You haven't really eaten anything in a full 24-hours, and you're shaking, soo…..?" Dabi never got an answer. The kid must've drifted off midway through his sentence, because his eyes weren't opening up again. Part of him feared that he'd just. Died. Right there. But he pushed the ridiculous thought away. He could see his stomach rise and fall with every breath even through the dark lighting, confirming that he hadn't in fact killed this kid. Well, it wasn't too great, but it was a start. Not killing him.

God.

Dabi grabbed the bundled up part of the sheet that wasn't being wrapped around Izuku's body (it was a big blanket) and spread it out, laying down with Izuku, who was already curled underneath with droopy eyelids. Just the little bit of skin that met Dabi's own was ice-cold, so he raised his body's heat a little to act as a sort of living heater. Izuku seemed to notice, and practically melted into him, absorbing the new warmth. As soon as he got comfortable, (which didn't take long because he was very worn out) Dabi began drifting off to sleep.

Before he could though, a small and frail voice slid through the quiet.

"I'm scared."

Oh jeez.

How was Dabi supposed to respond to that ? It was a breakable thing, the kid's' words; perfectly fragile. Dabi hesitated with his own, fearing he'd fracture something important.

"It's alright to be scared, I think. But I'm here," He pulled Izuku closer against his body, for once not worrying about his presence being unwanted, and nuzzled his chin into the kid's hair.

"And I'm not going anywhere."

* * *

Izuku didn't feel rested when he woke up.

His eyes closed and he felt tired and sleepy, but he never dreamed. It was strange for him, too; good sleep always came easy for him.

There wasn't a clock he could stare at to see how much time had passed since he'd first laid his head down, so he instead chose to focus his attention on one of the lamps in his peripheral. It was one of those camping lamps, and the light flickered very slightly. It wasn't even really a flicker, but a change in how strong the light was every minute or so.

On nights like these, as rare as they were before , Izuku quickly became restless. He had a desire to sit by one of the lights and sketch a bit, but it was too cold outside of their couch-shelter. And—

Crap.

And Izuku had forgotten his sketchbook at the house.

He couldn't help the frustrated groan that escaped him. How had he forgotten pretty much the only object that mattered to him? He didn't honestly remember much from yesterday (earlier that day? It was impossible to tell without a window or clock). It was all a fog. He'd forced himself to grab something , because be very faintly remembered thinking that he'd regret it if he didn't, but apparently his sketchbook hadn't peaked his interest at the time.

Could he ask Dabi to go back and get it? He wanted to, really, really badly. But that would be selfish, wouldn't it? Or would it not be? Did he not deserve to have this one thing to hold on to? Would he have to let go of everything he had left —?

_His Mom would have gone back._

It wasn't a comparable circumstance, he knew it, but there the thought was, nonetheless.

_His Mom would have dropped everything to get back that sketchbook._

Izuku missed her. He missed her more than anything ever.

He couldn't stop the wetness that trailed down his face any more than he could stop the pit that never went away in his chest. Why did everything hurt to think about? Why did everything come back to her?

He was crying about a stupid sketchbook now, but the realization of that didn't make him feel any better.

Izuku felt incredibly, undeniably lost.

It felt like one of those weirdly detailed nightmares that people had every now and then, where you wake up in the morning and forget that your dream isn't actually real, and you get all sad. But. But then you realize that it was just a dream. Just a silly little nightmare.

Despite himself, Izuku pinched him arm.

Nothing.

This wasn't a nightmare he could wake up from, huh?

His mom.

She was really dead.

"Kid? You awake?" Izuku was so startled by the noise that he couldn't help but recoil,

"You woke me up, I was sleeping." he croaked, trying, and failing, to keep the tremor and cracks out of his voice. His throat was awfully dry.

"Really now? You cry in your sleep often then?"

Ah. He'd heard that. But how? He'd been sure he hadn't made a sound, he could—

"You were quiet. It's just hard to ignore how, uh, wet , my arm was getting…" he trailed off,

Izuku's first instinct, which was to hide his face in his pillow, was now decidedly not an option as the 'pillow' he'd been laying on had apparently Dabi's arm the entire time.

At least it was dark, so he couldn't see how red Izuku's face probably was.

"Sorry." he faltered.

"God, kid, no. You're the absolute last person who needs to be sorry." he offered.

Izuku didn't have a response to this, so he didn't say anything.

"Look, clearly neither of us are feeling very sleepy right now,"

He was feeling very sleepy, actually. He just wasn't...sleeping. And Dabi sounded tired, too.

"So how about we just, talk, for a bit. About stuff that isn't heavy or anything. Just normal conversation stuff. Only if you're feeling up to it, of course?" the question was very much up in the air, and Dabi held his breath for an answer. Izuku knew that if he didn't want to talk, he wouldn't have to; or, at least, Dabi wouldn't make him. But maybe it would be good to have a normal exchange for once.

"Okay." he settled. Some of the tension that had been weighing him down seemed to evaporate at the agreement, and the tightness in his throat relaxed.

"To make it easier, let's make it a game. You know 20 questions, right?" he nodded into Dabi's arm. It was a first-day-of-school type of game.

"M'kay, so what's your favorite color?"

Izuku snorted.

"What? Do big kid's not have favorite colors or something, or..?" he teased lightly,

"N-no, just...wasn't what I was expecting, is all," he'd capped his hand over his mouth to stifle the noise, so his sentence sounded muffled and weird.

"Mine's light blue,"

Wow. He wasn't expecting that.

"Why?" Izuku wasn't entirely sure why he'd felt compelled to ask, but he'd blurted it out despite himself,

"You expect something different? Black? Think I'm emo, or something?" he said it jokingly, but there was a faint underlying defensive hue. Because of this, Izuku hesitated on his reply. Before he could come up with one though, Dabi added, "I just think it's pretty, I guess. I dunno. Never thought about it too much," he shrugged casually.

Izuku responded with a soft hum of acknowledgement.

"What about you?" he inquired.

"Blue, white, and red probably. Or yellow," Izuku didn't think his words through carefully before he said them, and the reply with instant,

"Oh, so you're an All Might fan. Either that or you have a weird fascination with America, but…" he grinned,

"Yea. He's really cool!" Izuku supplied easily. He couldn't stop the admiration that seeped into his answer.

"I asked the first one, so now it's your turn. Shoot," he shifted into a comfier position,

"Okay. What's your least favorite color," he couldn't help chuckling half-way through the sentence.

"Wow. You are so original. Uh, I guess red. Never liked red much," he shared simply. Izuku eyed his hair, which was in fact red, but looked away just as quickly. It was probably just a coincidence.

"I don't like red either." he remarked. It wasn't the answer he had planned, but it was true. He really didn't like red.

A moment after saying it he realized that he'd listed it as both a color he liked and disliked, but if Dabi noticed, he didn't say anything.

"Uh, favorite subject at school? I never actually went to a public school, but I've always liked history. It's interesting, I guess, seeing how far humanity's come,"

Izuku's attentiveness and general liking of school had worn down after a while, but there were still aspects of it that he enjoyed more than others,

"I don't really have a certain subject that I like, but it's fun taking notes and analyzing things. Like, you know, picking apart the details of something, thinking about what could make it better, weaknesses. I used to like doing that with heroes and their Quirks. I had a whole bunch of notebooks and everything too." unbeknownst to even his Mom, Izuku still had a few of his notebooks from years ago stashed away somewhere. He had fully intended to throw them away, but had fished them out of the garbage at the last second. The thought of them simply not existing anymore, out of reach forever, didn't sit well in his stomach.

Sometimes, though, you can't always decide last minute to save something.

Izuku learned that the hard way.

Before he could dwell, Dabi plowed on.

"You're telling me that you just kept notebooks analyzing heroes for fun ? You're something special, Izuku," the weirdest thing about it was that it didn't sound sarcastic or mean. He genuinely seemed interested in the notebooks. Nobody but his Mom ever had anything nice to say about them.

"Do you have any other hobbies, or does your day consist purely of writing in journals?" he probed.

"I think you might be bending the rules. Aren't we supposed to take turns?" Izuku chided. He didn't mind the double question, but the casual airiness in their conversation was so refreshing that he wanted to keep it going.

"It's 20 questions , kid. I don't think the rules are exactly set in stone. Just humor me, please"

"Nope. You have to wait till the next round, like everyone else."

"Are you kidding me—"

"Favorite dessert? Mine's Taiyaki" he continued snidely, interrupting Dabi's complaints.

"Fine. Icecream, probably?"

"What flavor?"

"I'm sorry, but I thought we were taking turns. What was it, 'you have to wait till the next round like everyone else'?"

"That's not fair, you can't use my words against me!"

"I can and I will."

"But I'm just a wittle kid!"

"Not falling for that, sorry. So back to my previous question, any hobbies? You know, besides the hero-stalking type," again, there wasn't a drop of malice in anything he was saying, so Izuku answered as truthfully as he felt comfortable.

"I actually don't watch hero fights that much anymore. I guess I grew out of it," he wasn't technically lying, at least, "I like drawing a lot, though. Oh! Who's your favorite hero? Mine's definitely All Might, he's really cool! But Present Mic is pretty awesome too. And Hawks, Midnight, Crimson Riot, Fat Gum, Best Jeanist, Ingenium— Endeavor has a powerful Quirk but he's not camera friendly. All of those mainstream heroes are really great, but the underground heroes are so underrated, like Eraserhead," Izuku stopped himself before he could go any farther. He was probably boring—or even annoying—Dabi at this point, and he was waiting for him to say as much, but he didn't. He didn't say anything. He was quiet.

"Dabi? I'm sorry if that annoyed you, I don't, I shouldn't have—"

"Naw, kid, you're good." another brief pause. The mood was ruined, now. All thanks to Deku, screwing it up and bothering Dabi when they were just starting to get along.

A beat.

"Listen, Izuku, can we talk about something? It's a little more serious than 20 questions." he asked. Izuku nodded.

"I want you to understand, that sometimes, heroes aren't always as good as they seem. Don't get me wrong though, there are some pretty good ones out there. But. But there are also some that aren't so good, you know? Not to burst your bubble or anything," Izuku was caught off guard by the randomness of the topic, but listened in anyways,

"Like, for example, you know Endeavor?" he swallowed quietly.

"Well I know someone, a few people, actually, that he's mean to. That he doesn't help, like heroes are supposed to."

Endeavor wasn't exactly the picture of friendliness, that was sure, but being purposefully mean didn't fit the hero description Izuku had in his head.

"What do you mean, 'mean'?" he asked.

"Well, uh. He's kinda like a bully, right? The people, they didn't do anything wrong, but he hurt them. He still hurts them. Also, I don't think he cares much about saving people as a whole. He's selfish, and mean, and bad. I don't think people like him are very heroic."

If Dabi was right, then Izuku definitely agreed. Heroes are supposed to save people, not hurt them.

"How do you know the people? The ones that he hurt?" that was something he needed to know. Because if everyone knew that Endeavor was a bully, then there's no way he could be the number two hero.

"They're really close friends of mine. They trusted me with this because I know them. I care about my friends a lot, and I don't like it when they're hurt. I'm the only one who knows, besides them,"

"Then why don't you help them? If you're the only one who knows, then you're the only one who can help, right?"

That question seemed to stump Dabi, because it took a moment for him to answer.

"It's not that easy, kid. I really, really wish it was, but it's not."

"Why? I'm sure if people knew they would—"

"People can't know. It's hard to explain, but this has to stay a secret. And trust me, I don't like it either. Promise you'll keep the secret? For my friend's sake's?"

Izuku mulled it over. He didn't understand what harm it could do to tell the public. People were getting hurt by a well known pro hero, and Dabi was the only one who knew. Didn't that mean that the only way the people could be saved is if higher authorities knew? But, on the other hand, telling someone would be a slap in the face to Dabi who had trusted Izuku and nobody else. Plus, he didn't know enough about Dabi to be sure that he was even asking and not telling. Better safe than sorry.

"Mkay. Promise." he mumbled unsurely.

"Good. Glad you agreed, cuz' if you didn't I would have to resort to...other methods,"

"What do you—" his sentence was cut short when Dabi's hands dug into Izuku's sides and he actually started tickling him —

"S-stop! Please-AHA—" he couldn't get a word out, his laughs were breaking up every attempted sentence as he struggled fruitlessly to escape.

"Beg for your life, you heathen," he said, continuing with the torture mercilessly.

"—stop, bahahaHA! St—" he was yet again interrupted by another fit of giggles, squiggling and squirming helplessly.

Finally, he stopped, but before Izuku could even take a break or get away Dabi already threw the sheets over him, successfully capturing him.

"Let me ouuttttt Dabi, I can't breathe, there's no air, I'm dying under here!" he wined.

"It's a sheet, kid. You're fine. Now, what's your favorite animal? I'll release you when you tell me."

"But it's my turn to ask a question!"

"Too bad kid. We're gonna be here for awhile, then."

"You're a cheater!" Izuku squealed as he kicked and pulled at the blankets.

"I'd like to think of myself as a persuader, actually," Dabi remarked.

"I'm not saying anything until you let me out,"

"You're not in much of a position to be bargaining, you know,"

"If I die of suffocation in here, then it would be your fault!"

"I'll take my chances, smart-ass,"

As if realizing his mistake, Dabi's grip holding the covers down loosened. It gave Izuku just enough space to wiggle out, causing Dabi to promptly try and stuff Izuku back under the covers.

"I didn't say anything, go back to being smothered."

Izuku huffed in protest and was able to pop his head and his now tangled mop of hair out from the blanket. He looked at Dabi with a smug look on his face.

"If I'm a smart-ass, can I call you lame-ass?"

Dabi threw a glare at him with no real heat in it, "_Absolutely not_."

**See you next week again! **


	4. The Start of Something IV

Dabi was biting his lip in concentration. Izuku seemed to be deep in focus writing in his new sketchbook sitting cross-legged next to him, laying down careful strokes of his pencil. They were resting in another tunnel of the subway, a single travel lamp illuminating the area. Dabi turned his head and pretended to be looking farther down the tunnel, deep in thought, as his hand began creeping towards Izuku's pocket stuffed with spare pencils and erasers. He felt the polished yellow side of one of the pencils, and began positioning his hand to worm it out, when—

"You do know that your about as stealthy as a horse, right?" Izuku remarked out of nowhere. Dabi recoiled.

"Oh come on, I almost had it! And plus, I snagged that chicks wallet earlier so we could get the dye."

"Well, when I'm expecting it to happen, it's a lot easier to notice, I guess, but the score's still Izuku: 24, Dabi: 17. You'll never beat me." Izuku was grinning at him, sketch forgotten in his lap.

They'd fallen into a rhythm, these past couple months. It felt comfortable and easy to talk now that they could easier predict each other's conversation patterns and mood swings. Things were far from simple, though. Izuku was still a small grieving child who didn't know how to handle emotions and loss. And Dabi? Dabi was still an uninformed teen who hardly had a clue what to say or do in response.

Like, for example, when he had to break it to Midoriya that they didn't have enough yen to continue buying essentials. They would probably have plenty of supplies left if Dabi had been able to convince himself to nab some of the loose cash he'd found around the house, but stealing actual money from the apartment felt somehow wrong. Damn him and his disheveled morals.

After a week or two, the food he'd grabbed from the house had either been eaten or gone bad, and, try as he might to ration water, it never worked out. Especially when the kid kept having meltdowns that left him parched and hungry. The water filter he'd bought as a solution, which had been a whopping 4400 yen, had sucked them dry of their budget (it was a necessary investment, though. Buying water bottles often was getting to be annoyingly tedious).

Dabi considered trying to get a job, but nixed the idea when he realized how clingy Izuku had become. It was a chore getting him to be in a different room for more ten minutes. Leaving for several hour intervals at a time was not going to happen any time soon.

Which brought him to their only real option.

Stealing.

Or rather pick-pocketing, to put it lightly.

Just as he'd thought, the kid was not thrilled about that at all. He tried to convince Dabi to try something else, but couldn't come up with any alternative options. Izuku gave in after Dabi insisted that there truly was no other way.

He wished there was another way, though. Dabi hated the idea of Izuku having to grow up around petty thieving and such general wrongness, but there just simply wasn't another choice. Survival was Dabi's top priority.

_"But it's wrong, Dabi," Izuku said into the blanket._

_"It's wrong to steal. Villains steal, Dabi. I, I don't want you to do what a villain would do…"_

_"I know." he started, crouching down to get on the kids' level.__"I know it's wrong, but we're only doing it cuz' we have to. It'll only be a few hundred yen, Izuku. Nothing anyone will miss, I promise. We need it more than they do." he soothed, rubbing Midoriya's hair reassuringly._

_"If you say so…" he mumbled, clearly not convinced.__"Hey, it'll be alright, okay? This is only temporary. And you don't have to do anything you don't want to. Leave it to me._"

Izuku started off by observing silently while Dabi got to work to avoid being left at the station. It was completely unexpected when about a week in, he was asking Dabi to teach him. Midoriya still clearly wasn't on board with taking things from others, but 'he wanted to help out as much as he could', as he put it. Dabi could respect that, so he gave him a few lessons, and he was out there.

And, wouldn'tcha know it, little brat was besting Dabi in only a couple of days.

If Dabi was to be honest with himself, he could pin it on the fact that, for one, Izuku had way smaller hands, and two, people tended to avoid sketchy-looking people with scars like Dabi on the streets. He had a sizeable disadvantage to start, but he didn't tell Izuku that. It was nice, seeing him prideful and happy. Was he about to ruin that to feed his own ego? Hell no.

Partially to make Izuku feel less bad, and partially for their own entertainment, they had made it into a game. A game that, apparently, the kid absolutely dominated at.

The days work thus far had earned them nearly a week without having to worry about not starving, so they were taking it easy, casually conversing with one another while Midoriya drew.

All was well and good until he caught the kid glancing at his exposed lower arm. He instinctively went to pull down the sleeve.

This again.

And that brought Dabi to the newest thorn in his side.

It was inevitable that a little kid like Izuku would become curious about his scars sooner or later, but his shy half-interest in them was getting annoying. He never asked Dabi directly—probably in an attempt to avoid being rude—but he kept giving his chin, ears, and arms quick fleeting stares before retreating his gaze back to the safety of his sketchbook.

Dabi almost wished that he'd just come out and ask him to his face.

And hey, speaking of faces, he could distinctly remember the first time that the kid noticed the marks on his own. As far as scars go, the ones on Dabi's face were a lighter irritated pinkish color, and from a distance, they were almost unnoticeable. So he wasn't surprised Izuku hadn't initially caught sight of them through his little fog. It was the afternoon of the second day when it happened, and Dabi was reading an outdated magazine about politics or dental health or some shit when he felt a pair of eyes on him. Dabi turned to face the kid, assuming he wanted to get his attention for some reason, but was extremely puzzled when Izuku's expression turned from bewildered to looking positively mortified; his face a completely new level of red. He immediately looked back down at his book, utterly humiliated, and tried to sell that it was what he had been doing all along.

Dabi didn't have the slightest inkling of what he could have done to exact such an extreme reaction, and he was about to voice as much when it suddenly hit him. Hard.

You see, all of his life Dabi lived basically secluded from anyone outside of his family. Hell, until recently he'd even been separated from his own siblings. Being self-conscious of several-year-old scars was not common behavior for him, really.

So, when it finally dawned on him, he felt more hilariously embarrassed, and even mad, than he'd felt in a while. As if the kid had purposefully walked in on him in the bathroom, no, the fucking shower.

And sidenote, what in the actual world could you say in response to something like that? The anger was misplaced, and the shame wasn't something he could explain to a child, so he did what any sensible person would do.

Abso-fucking-lutely nothing.

The magazine felt a whole lot more interesting of a read, after that.

Thinking back on it, he regretted not addressing it earlier on. Getting it out of the way at the start would have been a smart move on his part.

But hey, maybe that was just him wishing he didn't have to deal with it in the present.

Dabi could start that conversation topic with Izuku later in the day (or later in the week, or month, or better yet, never), but for now he would let him enjoy the serenity and peace of the moment. It was the least he deserved, after all.

"Are we doing it today, or not? Cuz' I think we have everything we need now…" the kid asked abruptly.

Well, so much for enjoying the serenity of the moment.

Another take back to meeting and then immediately living with someone new, is that Dabi's always been one to get lost in thought. And not just the 'huh, oh sorry, what were you saying again?' type, but the 'what do you mean I've been staring at that vase for ten minutes straight?' type. It was apparently unsettling, and probably also concerning, when Izuku first asked him what was for lunch and he refused to respond or even acknowledge his existence. According to the kid, more often than not, those dazes included him staring down a strand of his hair like it had murdered an entire orphanage. Not something you can exactly brush off after the third time around.

This brought Izuku to shyly suggest that he should dye his hair from the color that he'd idiotically admitted was his least favorite, to a different shade. Of course though, he didn't say it like that. Closer along the lines of, 'we don't look similar, so maybe if you dye your hair dark people will think we're related!'. The kid was awful at lying.

Dabi only agreed because dying his hair had been his plan for a long, long time. It was probably good that Midoriya had decided to bring it to his attention as a possibility.

"Ah, yea, sure. Make sure to grab all your stuff," he said turning to walk back alone. The kid looked like he wanted to object to him leaving before he was ready, but didn't say anything. Were his actions purposeful? Of course. As much as Dabi appreciated the sentiment (and he did appreciate it, in a weird way), the dependance Izuku had with him was a problem. He wasn't sure if the insecure behavior was old, or if it was an after-effect of what happened (he had a hunch it was the latter), but it was getting in the way of a lot of things. Plus, Dabi knew that there was no way it was healthy, having an attachment so strong that you can't be in another room without getting nervous. He had to put an end to it, so he did it the only way he knew how to: not addressing the problem or dealing with it properly and hoping it goes away magically.

There was a definite pattern in Dabi's caretaking tactics.

"Dabi?" he asked, assembling his stuff briskly.

"Yea, small might?" he paused. Although Dabi had started purposefully leaving a room in order to get Izuku to face his issue, he wasn't going to ignore an attempt at a conversation. He wasn't heartless.

"Can...you try to get a job? Sometime soonish?" he urged quietly, brushing off the nickname. And the award to the most unexpected question of the day goes to—!

"Kid… you know—"

"I feel like I'm better now though, really! You could leave me at the station for a little while, I'll be fine. What's the worst that could happen, right?" Dabi could tell how hard he was trying to make it sound convincing, but the waiver was there. Dabi knew how much stealing sucked for Izuku, even when he tried to act otherwise, but he had to make it clear that they just weren't there yet.

"What's the worst that could happen? You could have a freak-out, and I wouldn't be able to come home until later. We have no form of communication, and you can't follow me around," Ouch. His tone was harsher than he intended, but he got his point across.

The kid looked down and crossed his arms moodily. He looked more frustrated than sad, so Dabi took that as a cue to continue. Big mistake.

"Look, Izuku, I see that you're trying, and I need you to know that it's not your fault. I just want to make absolutely sure that you're ready, is all,"

"But I am ready! I'm not a baby, you don't need to be constantly looking after me!" Dabi turned around again to full face the kid, caught off guard by the anger. Izuku was red in the cheeks and his eyes bore accusingly into Dabi.

"That's not what-I'm not treating you like a baby, I just want you to be comfortable and make sure you're okay before leaving you alone—"

"I am okay! You treat me like I can't handle anything, like, like I'm weak—" And the simmer of frustration from earlier? It had completely surfaced now. The kid was pissed.

"Kid—" he said. He could feel a flicker of irritation start in him,

"DON'T CALL ME THAT! I'm NOT a kid, I…"

"You can just decide that you're not a kid, kid," he mocked, and, immature behavior aside, Dabi's annoyance was beginning to rise in his throat. He stepped closer.

"You act like you're such an adult all the time, when you're not! You're just like the kids at school! I don't need you, It was all great before, I, s-she—" In the back of his head Dabi noticed the way that the kids' fury extinguished, and he physically sagged, but Dabi wasn't paying close enough attention. He, he was so frustrated and mad and he didn't even know why and then a thought popped into his head and then slipped out of his mouth before he could choke it down—

"See! This is what I'm talking about. What if this happened while I wasn't here? I don't want you dealing with this shit by yourself." He realized what he said was far more spiteful than he meant it to be a second too late when Izuku, who was crying angry tears now, snapped and started stomping towards the exit, his art supplies forgotten.

"Wha-hey kid where are you going?" Dabi stumbled after him but stopped dead in his tracks when Izuku turned around and faced him with the fiercest glare he's seen the kid give, if you could even call it that. His wet face was all scrunched up and red as a tomato, and his eyes shot daggers.

"I don't need you anymore, I never needed you! I don't even know why I came with you in the first place, I can take care of myself fine!" with that, he swiftly turned around and abruptly hightailed it down the tunnel, out of sight in seconds.

Dabi stood in shock, listening as his footsteps grew farther and quieter, until all he could hear was his own heartbeat banging against his ribs.

Then he ran.

He ran down through the tunnels, and up the stairs, and it was late that evening so there were people everywhere, a swarm of children and adults and he didn't see him.

"Shitshtshitshitshitshit--KID!" he cupped his hands around his mouth as he yelled and ran at the same time, scanning beyond bushes and in crowds for a patch of dark green hair.

He didn't see him.

He couldn't find him.

He'd run away.

He'd run away.

"Kid? Izuku, I'm sorry, I—Please come back, I really fucked-screwed this up, okay I didn't—" he tried, pleading into the world. He had to remember he couldn't say the kid's name out loud like that, people could hear, and they could take him.

Dabi didn't have him right now, so that shouldn't even be a problem.

It felt like a problem.

Lots of things felt like problems.

He shook his head fervently. Dissociation was the last thing he needed right now.

The kid was really fast, even on short legs. He'd gotten away from Dabi like that.

He checked everywhere he thought the kid might've gone; the park, the—wait where did kids go when they get angry? With a sickening realization Dabi registered that he knew practically nothing about Izuku other than he favorite color, and what cats he liked, and his least favorite color, and—

What was Dabi doing?

He'd adopted a kid. A traumatized child who he'd basically told to fuck off because he tried to cry about his dead mom.

Dabi was still a kid, technically. Once upon a time, when he was a kid, a real kid, who liked lizards and wanted to learn soccer and wondered why he couldn't play with the other children, he'd cried about his Mom too.

Dabi had found himself back at the subway station some time later that day (dissociation really can sneak up on you, can't it?). His legs felt numb, despite his body being more heated than usual from the stress. He'd been running a lot in the past couple hours, and he still wasn't sure why he'd come back.

Dabi turned on a lamp, and the kid wasn't there. He didn't know why, but he expected him to be, sort of.

Izuku's favorite color was blue, and white, and red. He liked them because they were All Might's colors. Dabi knew this, because Midoriya had told him.

He dropped to his knees and tangled his hands in his hair. He couldn't do this. Izuku was right, why did he even take him in in the first place? He was nowhere near equipped to take in a child, let alone a child that had just lost a parent. But his words hurt. And they hurt frustratingly bad. Like a black hole had opened in his chest and started ripping him apart.

Dabi might like the kid more than he thought he did after all.

"_A coward."__"_

_W-what?" he spat with as much spite as he could, hating the way his voice cracked. Pathetic._

_"You're a coward. That's why you'll never be any good. You'll amount to nothing. You depend too much on those around you. And one day," the child quivered in fear and false bravado, mustering up a glare at the man glowering before him, even when a crack sounded,__"You're going to drag someone down with you."_

He was spiraling. His breath was stuck in his throat, and he couldn't, couldn't fucking breathe, why couldn't he—everyone can breathe just—

_"Look what you've done, look what you've DONE to yourself!"_

He_ didn't want to, because what he was feeling couldn't be possible, it just couldn't be, but he grabbed his head and yanked it down and—_

He_ looked in complete and utter horror, reveling in the flames that he couldn't stop._

It_ had never been this bad before, It was painful, so so painful, but it had been, h-he, he had never even, even thought that—_

_"You can't control them, can you? You're not making them, are you?!?"_

The_ conjoined pain and paralyzing fear killed his words, because what could he say? He forced himself to say something (anything) because if it was one thing his old man couldn't stand, was an unanswered question._

_"N-no, I, am! I c-can, just, just please...please," he focused hard about forcing the flames back inside of him, hoping and praying that they would magically retract._

He_ should have just stayed quiet._

_"You're useless! USELESS! You were supposed to be better! How do you expect to accomplish anything when you can't even use your Quirk right?!?"_

He grounded himself into reality by clawing at the floor, which was hot because it was on fire. Dabi realized that he was activating his quirk without meaning to. Blue fire danced along his arms and bit at his face, lightly sizzling the old scars, irritating them into a deeper red. He froze in disgust and fear, finally startled out of his memories.

He forced himself to stop shaking, slamming his hands on the ground to hold them still, barely noticing the rough gravel digging into his palms.

"Christ, I suck" he giggled somewhere between a laugh and a sob.

_"In for five, hold for four, out for eight. That's how you do it, that's it, you're okay, breathe with me."_

Dabi played back again and again like a record tape. Her voice was small and frail, but also soft and nice. It vaguely reminded him of Izuku. She always was able to calm him down, but it was far and few between that she was even there to do so; physically or otherwise.

Take in a breath let out a breath? Got it?

Good.

Jesus, fucking calm down already.

Once he finally got his breathing in order, he was calm enough to rustle down his quirk and stomp the flames on the floor until they dissipated into smoke.

It was then that he remembered why he'd been upset in the first place: Izuku.

Oh, god, he had let him leave (why didn't he move?). He was out there all on his own, and it was-god what time even was it? A quick look at his phone, which was quivering lightly, enlightened him in bright bold letters that it was 20:27. The sun would be setting and Izuku was out there with no shelter, no one to protect him. The reality was more solid than it was before, and for a moment he felt panic nip at his chest, as if threatening him, before it settled.

His head was clear enough to answer a pivotal question from earlier.

_"where did kids go when they get angry?"_

He'd been hysterical before, probably, because it seemed blatantly obvious now.

Dabi got up and started racing through the tunnels and up the stairs.

He passed houses and shops and groups of people and a park that was empty.

He reached the building in what felt like mere minutes, out of breath.

There was a moment, as he scaled the fire escape stairs attached to the apartment building, when he didn't see him. Dread crept up his spine as he climbed the steps faster, his heart beating faster and fear taking hold of him—

And then there he was, his head in his hands and his legs slung over the metal platform, linked together tightly.

Dabi sat down next to him. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to.

"I'm sorry," Izuku said through his hands. Dabi was stunned.

"I-I'm, so s-sorry!"

He broke.

"I'm sorry for getting angry and yelling, a-and, saying I didn't need you, and, and for never leaving you alone, and for crying, and running away—I don't even know why I got so mad, but I'm so, so sorry, Dabi!" he bawled openly into Dabi's sleeve, barely able to even get his words out between the sniffles and sobs.

"Kid, Izuku, it's alright. It's more than, alright—well, no, this situation isn't alright, I mean—you don't have to be sorry. For any of that." Dabi reassured. He had a feeling he should reprimand him or something, or at least make him apologize for running away, but he couldn't. He literally couldn't be angry at the kid right now.

"...Really?" he whispered carefully.

"Yeah, really. I screwed up. I shouldn't have left you to deal with everything all at once. That was selfish of me. You can ask me anything, right now, and I'll answer you honestly." Dabi was surprised with his own words and the promise he'd made, but there was no turning back now. The offer also seemed to pique the kid's interest, as he lifted his head from out of Dabi's clothes.

"Anything?" he asked. There was a hint of mischievousness in his tone. Thank god he wasn't crying anymore, at least.

"Yep. Anything." Dabi confirmed, preparing himself for a long night. Izuku gave himself a moment, before blurting,

"Okay. Do you like dogs or cats?"

"You are actually the worst." he declared, elbowing the giggling Midoriya gently.

"Dogs, but I like cats too. Now ask me something serious."

Izuku stifled his laughter and then stilled for a second. He looked away and rocked his legs back and forth.

"Why don't you like red?" that one was easy. He was sure the kid had already pieced it together (he was really smart) but it was an easy starter question; an ice-breaker, if you will.

"Endeavor has red hair, and I already told you why I don't like him. Put two and two together and, tada, I don't like red! Next question?"

Another pause.

"How did you get," he reached his tiny hand up to poke his face "—those?" he ghosted his hand over them before lowering to tug at his shirt, unsure. This is what the kid wanted to know most.

Dabi had his answer prepared already, anticipating the question in advance,

"Well, I have a fire Quirk, as I'm sure you've picked up on. It can get really hot sometimes, when I use it a lot, so it can burn me. The places where I have scars are the places my fire spawns when I go past my limit."

"Does it hurt?"—

"Does it hurt, 𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞? Does it hurt when I put pressure here—?"

"No, not usually. Only when I overdo it," the lie was unnecessary, but felt required.

Midoriya hummed in response and looked down at his hanging legs, swinging them casually now, instead of compulsively.

"Do you have a family?" he asked.

"Everyone has a family, kid." he stalled so he could think of something on the spot,

"Mom split when I was little, and I was never close to my dad. No siblings, either." it would be easier to uphold something that wasn't exactly technically a complete lie, as long as he was careful.

Dabi could tell how his answers lined up in a way that practically screamed 'LOOK AT ME! I'M ENDEAVORS KID!', but Midoriya seemed to take everything he said as fact, not seeming skeptical in the slightest. Izuku was pure and trusting. It wasn't a trait Dabi wanted to break.

"What was..." he stopped and rephrased, "Did you like your mom?"

Now, Dabi could have said anything in answer to this. 'No' would have worked. 'Never knew her' would have sufficed.

"She was a good person. I think she could have been great. I could have liked her, but—"

"Shoto—Enji, what's wrong with Shoto? Why is his face all wrapped up? What did you—"

"Relax, 𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞. This wasn't me. I would never ruin my masterpiece."

He recoiled, confused, before looking back up at his father. A new horrified understanding in his glare.

"What did you do. Where is she?!?"

"She was a threat to Shoto's growth, so I had to put her in a hospital. He's safe now, don't worry."

Rage rolled off in waves. He stepped closer, seething, his quirk naturally activating in response.

"That's what you don't understand," the flames stung his arms brutally as they grew in heat, lighting the room up with blue.

"It's ALWAYS you."

"Dabi…?" Izuku prodded, nudging his head against Dabi's arm.

"What? Oh sorry. Yeah, she was pretty cool. I never knew her as well as I wished I did, though." He answered simply, hoping the casualness could cover up his lack of response.

They were quiet for a long enough while that Dabi considered suggesting heading home, when, out of the blue,

"How...does it still hurt? Her being g-gone?" he lamented. His voice broke a bit at the end.

And god, Dabi was such a moron. Of course the question about his mom earlier had been aimed to start up this type of conversation. Dabi could be insanely dense sometimes.

"No, not really, but I don't think your situation exactly matches up with mine, you know?" he said. The kid didn't respond, sniffling and wiping at his face.

"It's okay to feel sad, kid. Or angry, or happy, or confused or, or anything. Things like this are never black and white."

Again, no response, but Izuku's crying turned more hiccupy and loud, and he gave up on wiping away the tears and snot.

"I miss her."

Dabi stayed quiet (he didn't know what to say), but offered his arms in a hug. Midoriya welcomed the gesture, enveloping his small frame into the folds of Dabi's T-shirt, his sobs becoming swallowed by the night.

'We're going to get through this, kid.'

He hugged back tightly, and swore to the stars.

'I'm going to make sure we get through this.'

**I guess I post it earlier than expected lol anyway I want to thank all of you for the support this fic has gotten so far!**


	5. The Start of Something V

"So how does one...approach...dyeing hair?"

Dabi offered while Midoriya was immersed in his sketchbook (his new go-to past time. Buying the thing was seriously paying off).

Last night had been like all of the bad nights before, save for the fact that Dabi had to carry an emotionally exhausted Izuku all the way home instead of being able to just leisurely tuck him and keep him warm. Also newsflash, the distance from the apartment to their hideout felt much longer when you're lugging an extra 60 pounds.

It had been hard falling asleep that night. They had problems; lots of them. Problems that Dabi hadn't and really should have thought about long before now. His brain had managed to supply endless ideas for ways he was fucking everything up, and Dabi took advantage of it. He kept a mental note on all of the rational things he needed to keep up on. Like hygiene, food containment, clothes, entertainment (the sketchbook wouldn't keep him occupied forever), clocks, heaters (for the future when Dabi wouldn't be there), and communication methods, to name a few.

For now, Dabi would just make sure the kid stayed happy. Happy and alive. The two kinda came in a package deal.

He would start with spicing up his day with something new, and hopefully exciting.

The kid, as it turns out, was thrilled about the idea when it was asked yesterday.

Then, this morning, he asked if he could do it himself. On his own.

First instinct? Hell to the fuck no.

"Wait, kid, where does it even say that you're supposed to get it wet—"

"They don't have to say it, cuz it's obvious. Hasn't anyone ever cut your hair before? They always get it wet before they start. I know what I'm doing—!"

"That's cutting hair kid, not dyeing it—"

"Uh uh uh! You said that I could do it all on my own! You _promised_!"

But you can guess just how well that panned out.

"Just to be absolutely clear, we're not cutting my hair today. Just dyeing. That's it." Dabi clarified. He didn't want to end up with a mullet by the end of this.

"I know that! But it's the same people who cut hair that dye it right?"

"Um," Dabi actually didn't have a solitary clue what people did when they cut your hair. He'd always gotten his done by his mom to avoid 'being infected by the outside world', and after that, his old man never gave him so much as a second of his time. I mean, who has time to take their oldest to get a trim when you're too busy beating the shit out of your youngest?

"I take that as a yes, so wet it is!"

Before Dabi could even think about objecting, he felt the kid pour an entire bottle of water over his head, effectively soaking it.

"I believe that was a tad too much water." Dabi deadpanned through gritted teeth.

"But you have so much hair! Seriously, when's the last time you've even cut it—"

"A while. And no, that is not me giving you permission to cut it, in case you were wondering. Dyeing it one thing, shaving my head is another."

"But—"

"No buts kid. I am drawing the line in the sand on this one," he said bluntly, because although Dabi was certainly a pushover, letting the kid use cheapass scissors to go hog-wild on his hair was on a whole new spectrum of bad ideas.

Izuku huffed defeatedly but didn't say anything to push the subject further.

While Dabi waited for him to get started, he could hear suspicious commotion from behind him that sounded very much not like the sounds you would expect someone who was getting stuff out of a package. It was the last straw when he heard what sounded like something ripping.

"What in the world are you doing over there?"

Honestly, Dabi would consider it a win if he didn't end up half-bald by the end.

"Are you reading the instructions? Clearly?" he questioned, hearing ruffling from behind him.

"Uh...what instructions?" Izuku tittered.

Oh boy.

"What do you mean, what instructions ?" Dabi was certain that when he'd picked out the dye he'd made sure it was starter pack with clear steps because, frankly, he had no clue where to begin when it came to doing hair.

"I mean there aren't any—oh." his words cut off mid-sentence. Dabi didn't like the sound of that.

"Kid? Everything going alright back there?"

"I think that the instructions were on the inside of the box."

"And?" a growing sense of exasperation grew inside him.

"Well...when I was opening it, I couldn't peel off the tape, so I ripped it? And, and now I can't really read the instructions, cuz they're ripped, n' stuff," he said bashfully, but also snidely. The little shit was enjoying himself.

"You have got to be kidding me." Dabi groaned, putting his hands up to his face.

The kid tried to suppress his giggles, and Dabi reached his arm over the fold-up chair to snatch the pack from him.

"Gimme the box. This is a big kid job," he said bluntly, reaching around. When he finally felt something cardboard, it was pulled away from his reach immediately.

"You said that I could do it all on my own!" the kid said, keeping the box away from Dabi.

"Well, you can't do it if you can't even read what to do!" he challenged, having half a mind to get up and grab it from the kid himself.

"How hard can it be? All that's in here is a packet, gloves, and two bottles. Easy."

Dabi was just about ready to strangle him.

"NO, not easy, there are rules and steps and stuff—" he daringly dove his arm in the general direction of where he thought the kid would be dangling the kit, and was lucky enough to snag it right of out Izuku's hands.

"HEY—!"

"Shush it. If we're doing this, we're going to do it right," he monotoned, surveying the damage done by the rip.

"But you said—"

"I _know_ what I said. And you will get to do everything, I just want to make sure that you don't somehow turn my hair purple or orange or something."

"That's not even possible! It's black dye!"

"Trust me, kid, you would find a way."

After opening up the box on the seams, not scrambling the instructions further, he could read enough to gather the main idea through the tear. It was pretty straightforward, but still needed to be done carefully enough that it didn't end up smeared on his face; Dabi assumed the stuff stained skin. Izuku would sure get a kick out of that.

"Okay, so the packet apparently has bleach stuff in it that has to be done first, so-" He plucked the packet out of the box and hurled it behind him, just barely missing Izuku's face. "Begone." Izuku let out a startled 'hey' from almost being socked with a packet of bleach powder. He retorted by picking it back up off the ground and shoving it down the back of Dabi's shirt.

"What the fu-uh, freeze-dried raisins?" He shook it out of his shirt and tossed it to his side, grateful it hadn't broken open in the process.

"If that had popped inside of my shirt I wouldn't have hesitated to—" he paused, processing what he'd read.

"Why would anyone need to bleach their hair if they're just gonna dye it black?" he asked, throwing his arms into the air for enthesis.

"Are you actually reading the instructions, because it probably explains." Dabi tilted his head to give Izuku a fugitive glare before looking back down at the instructions for extra clarification.

"Alright fine. I guess it's supposed to last longer with bleach so, yeah sure let's do it. If I go bald I'm shaving your head though." Izuku shot him a loathsome look.

"Okay, so that powder packet sitting on the floor somewhere gets mixed with the stuff in the container that looks like the ketchup bottles in restaurants but clear. Shake it up and get it all evenly in my hair, let it sit for half an hour, yada yada, get the idea?" luckily the instructions had pictures to go along with the descriptions. Perfect for an idiot like him to follow.

"Yeah, got it. Told you it would be easy!" Izuku jabbered while retrieving the powder packet off the floor. Dabi could hear him unscrewing the bottle, before getting ready to tear open the pouch.

"Be careful when your opening the bleach pack—"

"I knoowww!" he insisted. Dabi refrained from pointing out that he did not seem to know earlier when he tore the kit open without a second thought.

Once the small packet was opened successfully, he focused hard on trying not to spill the substance while pouring it into the clear bottle with only god knows what in it. He finished with minor spillage and begun to shake it vigorously, jiggling up and down as he did so.

"I think it's mixed kid, get to it already," Izuku grumbled something along the lines of 'yeah yeah', before adding some bleach onto Dabi's hair and kneading it in with the gloves.

"Woah, Dabi it turned blue! I thought it was supposed to turn white? Why isn't it working?" Izuku asked while smearing the stuff around.

"One, don't ask me. I've never gone through an emo phase and dyed my hair different colors," his dad would absolutely _murder_ him, "And two—wait. Does this count as an emo phase? Oh god, I never thought the day would arrive. Would you be mad if I bought speakers and started blaring punk rock music?" he jibed to Midoriya's utter horror.

"Ugh, do _NOT_ please,"

"Oh come on! I could totally rock an emo look."

"Dabbiiiii…"

"Right, right. That means no emo phase for you either though. I would not be able to deal with you wanting a nose piercing." the mental image of Izuku, a bubbly innocent kid, in punk clothes and emo hair, was hilarious.

He seemed to take a second to audibly blanch,

"If I ever go through an emo phase, you have permission to wax my eyebrows in my sleep."

Dabi gasped and threw his arms up with jazz hands, whispering, "the privileges."

The kid snorted in response, and Dabi remembered what he'd been asking about in the first place.

"And to answer your question, I don't think you're supposed to see the effects right away? It said to let it sit for half an hour, so I imagine it won't magically poof my hair to white."

The kid hummed in acknowledgment and continued squirting the stuff over the rest of his hair until there was none left. He stepped back, as if admiring his work from a new angle.

"Oh hey, it's working! It's starting to get white at the tips!"

They didn't have any mirrors (another one of those common household items Dabi would have to add to his list), so he handed Midoriya his phone to take a picture. He was right, the bleach seemed to be working its way from the ends to his scalp.

"I'm going to set a timer for thirty minutes. Then it's supposedly safe to wash out,"

After that, they would scrub it out and start the hair dyeing process. Dabi was pretty sure that there was supposed to be a gap of time separating the bleaching from the dyeing, but neither of them was patient enough to wait another day. Dabi just wanted this over and done.

He set a timer on his phone, and they only waited about twenty minutes of the time before disaster struck.

Dabi was scrolling through the news, scanning it for anything useful or important that he should note, when he started feeling a weird hot itchiness around his head. At first, he marked it off as a small side-effect of the bleach, refraining from scratching it to avoid accidentally turning his hands white or poisoning himself or whatever. He kept to distracting himself with dumb free apps he'd never bothered to delete years ago while simultaneously trying not to let the persisting itch get to him.

But then it got worse.

Dabi had to nibble at the inside of his mouth in order not to slur curses under his breath or yell as the itch turned into a growing burning sensation spreading over his scalp and neck. It wasn't even that it was particularly painful, it's just that it didn't go away and kept increasing and spreading as it scolded his face and arms and the fire wouldn't go out it just kept growing—

Dabi stood up, startled by the intrusive thought and his not-entirely conscious movement, before caving in and heading towards the bathroom. His hands hovered over his head, not wanting to touch the bleach.

"Wh-hey, Dabi! You're not supposed to wash it out yet—!" Midoriya protested, getting up from whatever he was doing and following him to their bathroom.

"Nope, I'm uh, I'm getting it out now," he insisted, grabbing their water filter and pouring the clean water into a bucket. The bathroom was looking ten-times better than it had when they'd gotten there initially, but it still had a long way to go. At least it was clean, so that when Dabi faced the sink while he was pouring the water over his head, he at least wouldn't gag.

"What, why? There's still like, ten minutes left, right?" he asked bemusedly.

Dabi tore his shirt off in seconds to save it from getting ruined and discarded it on the floor.

"It started burning for some reason, and honestly I can't help but feel that you are the root of the problem," Dabi had supervised Izuku along the way the entire time, and they hadn't strayed from the instructions once. The box said nothing about your head catching on fire, so it was safe to assume the kid had messed something up along the way.

"Hey, I did everything right! It's not my fault your hair is toxic or something," he asserted, still clearly entertained and luckily not insulted or hurt from the assumption.

"Well, whoever's fault it is, it is getting _off my head_," he articulated firmly, scrubbing at his hair like a madman with one hand while pouring water from the bucket with the other.

Izuku, against all odds, stopped pestering him and started full blown cackling. Seeing Dabi with only his pants on, _blond hair_ and acting like someone threw up on his head was too much.

In another circumstance, Dabi could've been angry at the kid's disregard for his obvious misery. This time, however, he almost felt like laughing along with him. He surely did look ridiculous, and the kid's laugh never failed to make him feel warm and proud of himself.

By the time Dabi had it all rinsed out and the pain had dulled, Izuku had melted into a puddle of giggles on the floor. He grabbed a towel, but, glaring at Izuku, instead started flinging his head back and forth like a wet dog; effectively sending water everywhere.

Izuku sobered up his giggle fit when he started getting showered with water.

"Hey, watch it—! You have a towel you heathen —HEY—STAWP IT!" He got up and bolted from the bathroom to avoid the spray, and Dabi grinned shitheadedly with satisfaction before actually drying his hair like a normal person. He got into an old shirt that he wouldn't have to worry about ruining (which he really should have done in the first place), and headed out to repeat the hell once again.

Dabi entered the room to find Izuku hanging backward off the edge of the couch, playing with his phone that he'd left unsupervised when he made his mad-dash to the bathroom.

The news had been left open when he'd left.

He immediately sprinted over and grabbed the phone, worried that the kid had seen something ugly on the news, or his account name, or something,

"What the hell, Midoriya?!? You know my phone's off limits, you can't—"

He was met with the camera app opened.

A breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding was let out.

The kid had only been taking pictures, that's all.

He looked back at Izuku, who seemed genuinely startled by the sudden outburst, and was eyeing him with confusion and slight concern.

Of course he'd overreacted. Of course.

He kept up the pissy facade, as to not come off as a lunatic being freaked out about a kid taking pictures with his phone.

"You can't, just, use my phone whenever you feel like it kid. You know, privacy and all?" He reprimanded sternly with literally no actual heat in it as he opened the photo gallery.

He was greeted with about ten to fifteen images of Midoriya, grinning and giggling mischievously at the camera. It was obvious they'd all been taken in the same ten seconds with how blurred the pictures with his movement were.

It was becoming increasingly harder to pretend he was angry at Izuku when he felt whatever was the exact opposite of anger. How could you look at those pictures and not feel an overwhelming urge to smile?

"You won't delete them, will you?" Midoriya asked, his lower lip sticking out dramatically.

"You took like, twenty blurry pictures. Of course I'm deleting them,"

He didn't.

"You're so mean! I was just trying to be nice…" he seemed to only be half-joking. Every fiber in Dabi's being wanted to tell him that it was completely fine and he liked the fucking pictures, but he instead kept to his dumb pattern and merely stuck out his tongue to tease him.

The lag in conversation that came after his gesture threatened to become awkward, so Dabi started a new one where they'd left off.

"Anyways, I honestly don't even want to see myself with blond hair, so let's get this over with."

Izuku flopped off the couch like a dead fish with a quiet 'okay' and followed him back into the bathroom. He still looked kinda deflated. Dabi only hated himself a little for that.

"Is this just like the bleach?" Izuku asked, ending their short fog.

Dabi quickly skimmed through the instructions, just to make sure, and grimaced when he saw how easily this stuff could stain not only clothes, but skin as well.

"You're supposed to do it in sections, get some dye, fully saturate it, and don't get it on my skin or you're gonna wanna turn into sonic before I have enough time to catch you. Sound simple enough?" the steps were just annoyingly complicated enough for Dabi to know that something was going to go wrong.

"What's 'saturated' mean?" Izuku took back the box and pulled on the second pair of gloves provided (that were far too large on him) as he asked. At least he'd perked up.

"Uh. It means a lot. Just add a lot. Also, you're supposed to shake the bottle before applying, it says," he added as an afterthought.

Dabi could hear the kid shaking up the bottle of dye behind him, this time hopping up and down as he did so. It was moments like these that Dabi truly grasped just how young Izuku was. How young Dabi was. Best not to think about it though, especially when they were finally having fun.

The kid opened the bottle with a pop, and immediately gagged at the smell.

"This is disgusting."

Dabi turned around again and snatched the bottle, sniffing it. "I don't know what your problem is, it smells fine. Kinda fruity, actually." Better than the bleach, at least.

Izuku gave him a disgruntled look and took the bottle back. He tentatively squeezed a glob onto his fingers and took a patch of hair, smearing it on messily.

"Grosss it's slimmyyyy!" he whined.

"You're wearing gloves, aren't you?" Dabi countered, rolling his eyes.

"But it still feels weirddd," he complained.

"And the bleach didn't feel weird? Just deal with it."

"The bleach was in a bottle, and it wasn't slimy!" he shot back.

Dabi could have come up with some other snarky remark, but settled for grumbling quietly while the kid worked.

The silence got boring after a while, and Dabi didn't want to take out his phone (the risk of Midoriya peeking over his shoulder and seeing the pictures when he turned it on was too high), so he goaded,

"Is my hair orange yet?"

"I know that you know that I have a bottle of black hair dye in my hand right now,"

"And I know that you know that I know that. Doesn't make it any less fun to bring up," he answered easily.

They bickered back and forth while Izuku finished up, doing a surprisingly clean job and only smearing a bit of dye on the back of his neck. It was so minimal, though, that Dabi didn't even mention it (the kid deserved a win).

"Nice work kid," Dabi got up, ruffling Izuku's hair on his way out of the bathroom to set the timer on his phone "And now we wait."

**Chapter 5 is done~**

**See**** you next week again.**


	6. The Start of Something VI

Midoriya grumbled to himself in frustration, putting unnecessary amounts of pressure on the back of the pencil as he erased away the mistake. Bits of the paper could be seen amongst the eraser shavings as he brushed them aside fervently, biting his lip in irritation as he did so.

Izuku had been trying to draw the same arm for what felt like hours now, always rejecting the result and trying again. He didn't want to start over entirely when he was so proud of the rest of the picture (it was of All Might waving), but the area where the arm was supposed to be was so screwed up that it took away from the image. He angrily clapped his sketchbook shut, begrudgingly deciding he'd work on it later.

The sudden noise seemed to get Dabi's attention, and he eyed him with an expression Izuku couldn't quite place. Izuku could tell the older's natural first reaction would typically be to tease, but there had been times recently where he'd simply blown up. He'd be fueled with such a foreign and frustrating aggravation in seconds for no reason at the slightest thing, and he didn't even know why. It confused Izuku, and he'd always be too ashamed of the outburst to apologize after, so nothing was ever done.

Dabi never made any attempt to bring it up either, so Izuku assumed that meant it didn't bother him. Hopefully, anyways. He'd mentioned before that it was okay to feel strong emotions, that it was normal, but Midoriya had a hard time figuring out why he was feeling anger of all things.

He went into a lot of heavy moods with oddly placed emotions for no reason at all. He felt sad. Not the 'my ice cream fell onto the ground' sad, but the 'deep-seated hard to lift a finger and want to suffocate in your own self-pity' kind of sad. The more he thought about it, the more miserable he got, so he tried not to, but it was so hard. Izuku tried his best not to cry, or do it quietly, because Dabi already had so much on his plate already. It was the least he could do. Even so, an annoying part of him wanted Dabi to see him crying. He wanted Dabi to see his tears and hold him and tell him it's alright whenever he got that way until he cried harder.

But Dabi had better things to do, and thinking like that was selfish, so he tried his best to keep it to himself. Plus, everyone feels sad when bad things happen. He can at least understand where it's coming from. People get sad when things die. It made sense.

The anger didn't. The anger came out of nowhere, and it wouldn't go away.

Just like the sadness, it happened for no reason, and it happened all. The. Time.

The way Dabi's voice sounded could set him off, his toe nicking the edge of a wall, drawing, drinking, eating, and the list went on.

Sometimes, Midoriya could feel sad and angry at the same time, and it sucked. He'd start feeling mad about something he should be feeling sad about, and he'd start crying, and then he'd get angry that he was crying, and when Dabi asked him what was wrong he felt just about ready to scream at him—

Yeah, the sad anger was frustrating and confusing.

But even that wasn't as bad as the feeling of numbness.

It scared him more than everything else combined.

It came around when the sadness was supposed to. Picturing doing things with his Mom almost always made him sad, and sometimes certain activities or items did too. Sometimes he'd think of her on purpose to get sad, and he had no idea what that was, but that's beside the point.

The point was that he'd think of her, and sometimes, he didn't feel anything. Not anger. Not sad. Not happy.

Just emptiness.

He could picture the way her body would envelop his in warm and affectionate hugs that she knew he needed, or how she always tried her best to help and take care of him, no matter what. He could bring up memories of baking on late nights and watching shows together snuggled up on the couch on early mornings. He could even relive that one memory that he shouldn't think about in vivid, horrifying detail.

And he felt nothing.

He couldn't bring himself to. The attachment was dead. He couldn't even cry.

It was absolutely terrifying.

And a part of him, a buried and disgusting piece of him, craved it in a way that repulsed him.

"Hey, Midoman, you good over there? You've been staring at that stain on the ceiling for way too long," Dabi prodded carefully out of the blue, mindful of his mood swings.

Izuku shook his head to clear his dark thoughts away and turned his attention to a moderately concerned Dabi.

It was for the better that he'd interrupted. It probably wasn't good for Midoriya to think so much about it, especially on a day as important to prove himself as this one. His mind was used to over-analyzing practically anything, after all.

"Yeah."

He couldn't think of anything else to say.

The older paused, seeming to think through his words cautiously.

"Cool, cool…" Dabi mumbled, looking down at his phone without really reading what was on it. He clearly still had more to say, but didn't know how to say it.

"So, imma be heading off soon. They want me there in thirty, but it's better to be early than late. Good first impressions, you know?"

He said it casually, but Izuku could feel him scanning for any adverse reaction.

As of late, Dabi had been trying to get as many job interviews as possible. Most of the time he didn't even make it past the resume; even when he did, he'd fail the interview. Midoriya had a theory that he was doing it on purpose. That Dabi didn't trust that he'd be alright if he left for too long, so he made up excuses to leave. It was just a hunch, though.

This particular job would be the first time Dabi left for nearly the entire day; if he actually stayed, that is. It was definitely a test to see how much he'd improved at being alone, and Izuku felt confident. He had a chance to prove to Dabi that he wasn't just a clingy burden. Or, at the very least, it was a step in the right direction.

"Yeah, sounds good," he answered simply, avoiding eye contact. And Izuku really was getting better in the being alone department. It wasn't an act he was trying to withhold. Brief periods around the residence were now a breeze since he knew Dabi was within yelling reach. Even being left entirely alone was easy in moderation, especially as long as he didn't dwell on it. Nothing was perfect though, and pressure still built up in Izuku's head the longer he was away.

Dabi finally sat up and grabbed an old (but nice) jacket, slipping it on and storing his phone in one of the pockets.

"Remember, under no circumstances do you leave the subway station. I'll be back in about 6 or 7 hours with dinner. See ya then, kiddo,"

Izuku glanced at his wristwatch, a cheap one they got from the dollar store. It was almost twelve in the afternoon, that meant eight hours in the confines of an empty room with nothing to accompany him but his terrible mind and no distractions.

_(It's okay just don't think about it everything will be fine just stop—)_Dabi turned around to give him a quick wave goodbye, but hesitated when he saw his likely visible distress.

"Hey hey, relax kid, don't sweat it," he reassured, taking a few steps forward before crouching down to meet his face.

"You've done this before, and you can do it again. When I come back, we can eat really unhealthy food, and I'll tell you about all the pissy customers I'll inevitably end up dealing with. I'll even snatch a chocolate chip cookie for you. Deal?"

Luckily, Midoriya wasn't at the point of tears yet, but his voice still wavered when he said,

"...Okay,"

The cookie sounded nice, though.

Dabi ruffled his hair playfully, eliciting an agitated huff from Midroiya, and stood back up.

"That's the spirit. I'll be back before you know it, I promise," he soothed with a smile and a few quick finger guns shot in Izuku's direction. With that, Dabi closed the door and was gone, leaving Izuku to deal with immediate and crushing atmospheric stillness.

He took a breath as he felt the warmth of where Dabi had messed his hair disappear (his hands were always unnaturally temperatured) and flopped onto the floor in defeat.

It was still high noon, but Izuku wanted nothing more than to sleep what remained of the day away until Dabi returned. The desire only proved to upset him, as he kicked fruitlessly at the floor in response. Man, he really couldn't do anything on his own, could he? He found himself for the first time in a very long time longing for a friend.

The thought was practically alien compared to what his mind had been busy with for a while, and he embraced the newness with open arms.

Yeah, a friend would be awesome to have; even one just conjured up from his mind would do. He supposed Dabi was his friend, but the label didn't seem to fit in his head quite right. Which was strange, because what was Dabi if he wasn't his friend? Midoriya benched the question for later, though. Rule number one of being alone was not to think about anything that could make him worry, and Dabi was on the top of that list.

He subconsciously fiddled with his fingers. The pinkie on his right hand clicked when he bent it, and didn't go away when he popped it. He vaguely remembered someone in his class bragging about something similar, specifically having what she called an unopposable thumb that clicked in weird directions to make it look broken. Maybe this was something like that. Maybe if he knew it a year or two ago, he'd have made friends with her. Who knows. He doubted it, though.

He noticed a tear slipping down his cheek and angrily wiped it away. There it was again, the angry sad that he hated so much.

The heaviness and ruefulness he felt after that particular speculation was enough to convince him to transition to a new topic before he really got away from himself. He kept to the underlying theme of friends to make it fun, almost like a game.

He didn't have many positive memories of interacting with classmates, he reminded himself bitterly, but then again, the world was bigger than his school. He remembered heading off to other playgrounds where kids his age that went to different schools would be. They always played with no quirks to make it fair, so no one needed to know that he didn't have one.

It was very refreshing and fun hanging out with kids who treated him nicely; he even made a couple of friends along the way. From what he could remember, his favorite game was spiders on the ground: an activity where someone's the 'spider' and everyone else has to try and not get caught. The spider had to close their eyes as they searched the structure for someone to tag. Izuku smiled at the memory of other children surprised and in awe when he managed to climb along the outside of the playground stealthy to avoid getting caught. He was always the hardest to catch by far. It was rare being praised by people his age, and the recollection of the sentiment still made him happy.

He allowed himself to stew in this contentment until he got a glimpse of the neon orange of his wristwatch proclaiming it had only been twenty-six minutes since Dabi left.

Midoriya gaped in disbelief at the time and did a double-take, wishing the numbers would change. He wasn't even a seventh of the way through.

He could hear his heart beating as clearly as if his ribcage was a speaker, and an uncomfortable wave of heat overtook him. He legs shook, and he sat up to latch onto them to muffle the tremors. He hardly had time to breathe before he was already under; drowning.

Izuku wouldn't be able to do this, there was no way he'd be able to wait for eight hours, how could he think for a minute he was ready for this? Why had he tried to convince Dabi? What was the point? The distance from now to the future where six hours pass seems so far away, no, unreachable. Izuku is all too aware of his heavy breathing as he felt his lungs grow smaller and smaller, needing more and more air by the second.

His head pounded and screamed at him, needing to know what was _wrong_ with him _why_ was he like this why couldn't everything just be _normal_ it shouldn't even be like this in the first place _this was wrong it was all wrong everything, everything is wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG—_

The absolute unmoving concept of time hung over him, making him feel small and useless and terrified as he felt his grasp on everything around him grow colorless and senseless. His watch constricted him like unmoveable chains that were choking and suffocating him and filling his head with lines that went on and on forever. He desperately craved to tear it off of him as it was surely killing him with its unbearable tightness, but he couldn't find it in himself to move from the sheer force of how far away everything was and how his very soul quaked in nauseating and overwhelming fear.

He tried his best to run away from it all and scream louder than the chaos booming in his brain, (_was he really screaming? He felt like he was_ ) but it all felt too big and he felt too small and frail because he doesn't have a quirk _who will protect you now—_

Izuku somehow managed to pick out noises of distress that sounded small and he clung to it against everything else crashing against him, because he knew it was real. He followed it until it grew closer and bigger to him than everything else used to be until he was back again, feeling the ground and smelling Lysol and seeing through tear-blanketed eyes the door he'd never turned away from.

He took big, full, deep breaths, letting his body relax on the most uncomfortable floor ever as he sloppily wiped tears away from his concerningly hot face. His hand afterward met the back of his sweat-coated and equally hot neck to scratch it. He felt really itchy.

He laid there for a bit, letting the cool air calm what was left of his nerves down a few more notches. He refused the nagging temptation to peek at the time. He wasn't that stupid. Although, he was beginning to question just how dumb he truly was after getting so upset over looking at a plastic watch. It hardly even felt like a big deal now. Honestly, he had no idea was wrong with him, because something definitely was. The only thing that had changed had been...had been that one thing that had happened. But nobody ever told him loss came with what he'd just experienced.

A while passed on the exceedingly uncomfortable ground with nothing but stale attempts at positivity that hurt his throbbing head. Izuku knew he should get up and take some ibuprofen before it got worse, but he hardly felt like it. He gained the courage to sneak a peek at his wrist and was somewhat relieved to see that a little over an hour had passed. It wasn't much, but it felt like progress. The feeling was invigorating, to say the least, and gave him the strength to (finally) do something. He slapped his cheeks a couple times and shot up from where he had been sitting all morning, deciding he was going to do something productive with his new random and strange boost of motivation.

Stopping and thinking of something he could actually do, he thought of what he usually did on days off from school. Truthfully, he'd never put much stress on afterschool activities before, because it had never really mattered to him. If he wanted to, he could spend all day watching TV lazily on the couch. The understanding of those things being privileges he never appreciated before stung bitterly in his chest, but he refused to let it ruin his new mood.

Putting a hand to his chin, he listed off everything he could think of that could work out. Drawing obviously came first as the most easily accessible task, but he couldn't start another sketch without knowing somewhere in the back of his mind that there was an All Might drawing that wasn't finished. Frustration was too much of a risk with how hard it was to get rid of.

'Maybe later, when I have less time to burn,' he thought to himself.

He remembered what he'd been reminiscing about earlier, and briefly considered finding kids at a playground, but crossed it out when he remembered how Dabi had explicitly told him to stay put. Of course, if he did leave, Dabi would never have to know, but the guilt of breaking his trust like that would be cripplingly challenging to deal with later.

Next was cooking, which he didn't have any of the resources for. That was something he'd neglected to think about for the longest while. He missed it a lot for multiple reasons, and wasn't able to block out the emotions that came with it in time to spare himself the grief. He bit it back with minimal eye-watering and sidetracked to the next idea.

The memories of cooking had brought upon a whole other category; food. Namely how unhealthy it had been recently. He could hardly blame Dabi for it—especially when Izuku was the prime reason he was only just getting a job now—but that combined with his lack of physical activity had driven him horrifically out of shape. Not that he was ever really in shape, but he at least ate relatively healthy and stayed active enough to keep his small stature. Now, however, he had the beginning of a gut, and zero muscles. In fact, backing up his point, his little runaway stunt had completely winded him and had made him extremely sore the following day.

Izuku snagged his sketchbook, neglecting the half-finished All-Might drawing and flipping to a new page. If he was going to do this, he was going to do it right. He scrawled 'Exercise Plan' at the top and nibbled at the end of the pencil in thought. A year or two ago, Izuku had gone through a short couple-month phase of trying to work out and get fit. It'd been the period when the bullying had first really started getting to him, but before he'd developed his tolerance. The school counselor his Mom made him go to told him that exercise and staying active was good for his state of mind, and desperate, dumb Deku had hoped getting strong could make people like him. That let-down was a disappointment for a bit, but that wasn't the point. The point was that he had a general idea of what work-out routine would work best in his scenario.

Midoriya brainstormed rapidly, finally for the first time in ages putting his analysis ability to good use. He scribbled down new ideas and crossed out bad ones, creating a plethora of nonsense across several pages. Eventually, he was able to devise a messy and rough plan that would suffice for the time being. It could be expanded on later.

For evident reasons, he was unable to do anything that required a lot of room or resources, so he kept to simple stuff. His list consisted of two sets of ten squats, fifteen pushups, thirty-five jumping jacks, and ten of those elbows to knee things he forgot the name of. He could come back and do the sets over again if he didn't feel tired by the end (which he predicted he would).

Izuku tore the paper out carefully, wishing he had tape or at least tacs to put it up on the wall (like the people in the movies did before they did their own epic training) but the tabletop could work for now. He pushed a few random articles from the biggest floor space in the room and began his regimen. Eager to start, Midoriya skipped the stretches and got cracking, thrilled to actually do something productive for once.

That innocent excitement lasted about seven pushups in, and then shriveled up and died. He quickly learned that he was way more out of shape then he thought he was, and working out wasn't nearly as inspirational and fun as epic movie training made it seem. He limbs screamed at him with the strain, and he soon became coated with another layer of sweat. However, despite this, he was still determined to at least meet his original goal of finishing the set once.

A few hours later found him lying on the bathroom floor with a tap-water soaked towel wrapped around his body. His arms felt unattached and noodley from the pushups, and his legs ached dully. His stomach, however, had received the brunt of the project. It was painful using it to sit up or down and hurt as if bruised when touched, so he used his now pathetically exhausted arms to laboringly force himself off the ground. Izuku noted that he smelled absolutely nasty, but the routine had been more or less a success.

Of course, it had been strenuous as hell, but giving his old school counselor credit, he felt a great deal better than he did before. If anything, the soreness only added to his motivation to get stronger. Looking at his watch once again, he was proud to see that there were only two and a half hours left before Dabi returned, and he grinned happily. Sadly, the proudness was interrupted when he caught another whiff of his BO and gagged. Yeah, he should probably take care of that first before he took to a new activity.

Entering the bathroom, he paused for a bit to appreciate how far it had come since their arrival. It still wasn't much, but it was the cleanest room in the house thanks to hours upon hours of scrubbing and cleansing on Dabi and Izuku's part. They'd even acquired an adjustable hose from a supply store to turn the area of the room with a prebuilt drain into a makeshift shower. Only problem was that the water temperature only had one setting; literally freezing.

On most days, Dabi would stay in the bathroom for a while with his quirk in use to heat it up enough for the cold to be less gruesome, but for now his only option was to grin and bear it.

This plan also didn't last long, because the frigid temperature was only bearable for ten seconds before he had to jump out and throw a towel over himself, shaking violently. He settled for wetting said towel and scrubbing himself down as an alternative to wash the sweat away and rid of the awful smell. It wasn't like he needed to be peachy clean or anything, he'd just taken a shower the night before.

He got dressed into more comfortable clothing that he could sleep in and wandered back into the main room, grabbing a bag of chips and his abandoned sketchbook and pencil along the way.

Izuku sagged snuggly into the couch, feeling exhausted, but in a good way. He was used to feeling tired nowadays, but it came with a lag and lack of motivation. Right then, the tiredness he felt was anything but that. He was filled with determination not to mope around despite the sleepiness, and suddenly wanted to finish his All Might drawing.

He shoved a handful of chips into his mouth and wiped the grease onto the fold-over before flipping to the right page and surveying the drawing. The damage done was pretty irreversible, enough so that one more slip-up would tear through the page. That was fine though, it only meant Midoriya would have to get creative.

The page was almost definitely unsalvageable with how much of it had been aggressively erased, so attempting to drawing over it, even if he did it right the first time, would be futile. A better idea would be to trace the original drawing onto a new piece of paper for a clean slate, but the parchment was too thick to see through. Unless…

Izuku got up on his knees and leaned towards the closest lamp, holding the wrecked paper over the light. Aha! It was far more see-through than it was before, and the lineart stood out boldly. He ripped out a blank page and put it in front of the old sketch before placing it over the lamp again and grinning. It would be easy to trace now.

He spent the next couple of minutes holding the two pages in the light with one hand and lightly tracing with the other. Izuku then sat back down, his arms aching terribly from the earlier work-out and now holding them up for so long, and went over the sketchy impressions with bolder strokes to define the lineart better. He got the arm right on his second try this time, and even went through the trouble of getting some colored pencils as a finishing touch.

Once the masterpiece was finally complete, he was happy with the drawing, and more importantly, with himself. All Might smiled triumphantly at him, and Izuku smiled back. When Dabi returned, Izuku would have to ask him to buy a frame, or at least tape, to put it up somewhere. It was the best thing he'd drawn in forever, something he was genuinely satisfied with.

Midoriya felt an oncoming yawn, and didn't bother to suppress it. It was getting late, and as much as his original plan was to prove himself to Dabi through being conscious and victorious when he arrived, he felt that he had earned a well-deserved good night of sleep.

He tumbled to his side into the nest of blankets and immersed himself into them, far too sleepy to turn even one of their many lamps off.

Izuku had actually done it. He'd found a way to stay sane and productive for over six hours on his own. He smiled to himself brightly, hugging a nearby pillow close to his chest in glee. He imagined Dabi next to him, hugging him, telling him how proud he was. He imagined the cookie he would get to have for breakfast. He imagined his All Might artwork hung up on the wall in all of its glory. It was these things that Izuku finally drifted off to sleep, beaming softly to himself.

* * *

Dabi was fucking done.

Dabi was done and tired and ready to quit except he couldn't so it sucked ass and he wanted to lie down at home but wasn't even out of the goddamn building yet.

He threw his apron into the fucking apron pile or bin or whatever, checked out, said a few insanely half-assed and mostly mumbled goodbyes, and got the fuck out of there.

It was later at night, past the usual people-getting-out-of-work rush hour (although he supposed it didn't really matter since he didn't have a car, but there were still less people giving him weird looks on the streets, so there was that). The sunset had already disappeared beyond the horizon, but the sky wasn't yet at its peak darkness, and moonlight lit the city up nicely. It was almost a full moon. How quaint.

The walk from starbucks to their little hobo-house was a moderately short one, but it was enough for Dabi to regret existing just a little more. He'd follow the main street for a couple blocks before veering off into the more discreet backroads for the rest of the way. This last step wasn't entirely necessary, but it only lengthened the trip by a little and helped him avoid some of the more busy street-cams.

Dabi stopped off at some off-brand family owned Japanese take-out place that he had no chance of remembering the name of (they seemed very nice though, so maybe he should have) and meandered through a few more backstreets before finally arriving at the entrance of the subway. He was thankful he hadn't put the planks up before leaving that afternoon, it spared him the minute five-minute effort of taking them off.

Entering the living room, Dabi prepared for the worst, but instead released a breath of relief at the realization the kid was sleeping peacefully already. He relaxed and allowed the tension that had festered inside of him all day to evaporate as he stored the takeout and cookie away in their food-lunchbox thing; it would make for an easy and filling breakfast. He was also glad that the kid wasn't awake, because this way he didn't have to answer any questions. Dabi was definitely way too tired and on edge to relay the experience without snapping.

He numbly flicked off of the lamps before shedding his jacket and hanging it up on the rack. Dabi climbed into bed with Izuku, his belt pressing uncomfortably against his side. He suppressed an audible curse of discomfort and settled for frowning slightly as he buried himself in covers. Dabi wanted to take it off, but now that he was completely settled in, he didn't want to risk waking Izuku up with the movement.

"...Dabi?"

Whoops. Too late.

"Yeah, I'm back kid," he murmured, turning his frown into a slight smile. The kid was turned the other way, though, so he couldn't see it anyway. He wasn't sure why he did it in the first place. It felt right.

"Let's save the talking for tomorrow, okay? I think it'd be best if the two of us got some shut-eye."

A beat, and Dabi almost worried he'd said something wrong.

"mmmmkay," Izuku finally replied quietly, hugging his pillow tighter.

He didn't sound upset or disappointed, so Dabi nodded. He was tempted to succumb to his own exhaustion and leave it at that, but he still wanted to say one last thing.

"And Izuku?" he tried despite himself.

The kid turned his head to signify he was listening, even though he couldn't see through the pitch-black darkness.

"Mhm?"

Dabi swallowed.

"I'm uh. I'm proud of you,"

Ah shit, that was far more awkward than before. Maybe he should have left it where it ended.

The kid was still, so still, in fact, that it was clear he was straining to do so.

Slowly, he turned his head back, and settled again, forcing his body to go limp in false casualness.

"Thanks."

There was something in that thanks that made Dabi's chest go warm and his mouth quirk up involuntarily. Something that was practically invisible. To anybody else in the world, Dabi was sure it sounded like a simple, meaningless gesture of dull appreciation. An overused word that wasn't even said in a particularly fond way. To Dabi though, it was so, so much more. It was laced with true and genuine endearment like nothing he'd ever heard before.

And in that moment, Dabi wondered to himself.

He wondered.

Is this what it felt like?

What it felt like to love somebody?

**Please be safe out there to everyone around the world. Don't lose hope and keep fighting. **


	7. The Start of Something VII

Dabi parted his way easily through acres upon acres of tall and moist grass as he wandered capriciously. There was a soft, cushioned straw bedding beneath him that was nice against his bare feet, and dew from the surrounding flora dampened his shorts and legs lightly. The sun was present, but not overwhelming; offering him a gentle and comforting warmth. The air smelled subtly of something sweet, but it was so faint Dabi nearly missed it. All was still, calm, and quiet. He continued walking straight forward with no destination in mind, simply enjoying the imperturbability.

Suddenly, in the distance, there was smoke.

Dabi smelled it before he saw it.

It quickly overtook the slightly sweet aroma and made Dabi frown. He wouldn't turn around, though. He was walking in that direction anyway, and changing course would be annoying, so he continued out of curiosity.

The actual sight of the reeking fumes practically phased out of nowhere, as if there was an invisible fog masking his surroundings. It was unsettling.

He trekked on towards the source despite this. Dabi wanted to know what was burning, but a nagging unexplainable urge told him to turn around. Warned him that it was pointless.

He ignored it.

The closer Dabi got, the larger and more pungent the exhaust cloud was getting. It tainted the once blue sky, and blocked out the sun, making Dabi feel suddenly cold. The nasty stuff was making it kinda hard to breathe. He used his shirt neck to cover his mouth.

The voice was getting more desperate now, heeding and imploring him to leave, but Dabi refused. All he needed to do was see it once, and then he could go. He had to know.

All at once, the coolness from the lack of sunshine was swept away by an oncoming gust of thick heat and smoke. Dabi produced a startled noise when it hit his face and made his eyes sting and water. He used his free hand to wipe his eyes as he rasped, but he kept on.

Finally, he was close enough to see the origin. It too had phased out of nowhere, just like the smoke, but at a farther distance. He couldn't yet make out what it was.

He sped up his walk to a near jog, because literally all that he needed to do was _know_ what it was and then he could get the hell away but he just _had to see what was burning ._

There was desperate screaming hammering at his head now, demanding and _begging_ that he absolutely couldn't be there anymore and that he had to leave right away or something really bad would happen. It took all Dabi had to soldier through it (it was impossible to ignore now) as he powered forward.

Then Dabi saw it.

Or, more specifically, it suddenly just teleported directly in front of him all at once.

It was the house Dabi had grown up in.

𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞's house.

He stood in his place, just kinda. Standing. The wood crackled and yelled as the place was devoured by fire that was red and angry(he wasn't sure if he was happy or not about that).

The voice had gone dead silent.

But hey, that was cool, because another one replaced it from _inside_ the house .

"...𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞?"

Dabi turned, and then ran.

He ran as fast as he could, pretending that he couldn't hear how the voice feebly cried for him to wait as it presumably ran after him.

The sky was no longer blue and the atmosphere no longer peaceful—it seemed that the smoke from the fire had contaminated everything, and Dabi was heaving it in laboringly in gasps as he sprinted away. The voice was relentless, though; he couldn't shake it.

"𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞! 𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞, please, please don't leave me! DON'T GO!!"

The young and far too recognizable pleading broke at so many parts as he practically sobbed them out, but there was no way Dabi would be able to face it. Not after what he'd done.

The once clear meadows were growing thicker and harder to traverse as he escaped. Twigs dug and scratched him all over his legs, and he could tell that his feet were bleeding from the copious amount of thorns he was stepping on.

He wasn't running anymore, moreover just trying to hopelessly tear his way through the dense thickets. The voice was closing in on him.

The storm raging around him was drowned out by the drums in his ears and his ragged breathing as fear got a hold of him. He wouldn't turn around. He couldn't turn around.

A small, shaking hand was placed on his back.

_Dont_.

"𝔗-𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞….p-please look at me…."

_He couldn't. He couldn't do it, not after—_

" 𝔗𝔬𝔲𝔶𝔞, LOOK AT ME!" the voice all but screamed suddenly, it's bravado dying off towards the end into wet hiccups.

So Dabi looked at him. He turned around, and he looked.

He didn't see who he thought he would. He didn't see who matched the voice and it's crying.

He saw Izuku.

He looked dreadful, wheezing and panting with an overabundance of raw emotions clear on his scrunched up and tear-and-snot covered face.

Then, before either of them said anything (what could Dabi even _say_— ), he started screaming a shrill and terrifying scream.

* * *

Dabi came awake in the dark with a small gasp and a rapidly beating heart, blinking. He was relieved for about a split second when he identified his location (fucking stupid trippy-ass nightmares), but then his groggy and impossibly slow brain also identified that the screaming was in fact, still happening.

"Holy fuck holy SHIT—" he tussled with the blankets, his brain already going on overdrive. The instinct to activate his Quirk in response to his panic was so strong and powerful he had to bite down on his tongue to keep it under wraps as he turned to the source of the screaming, which was, of course, a flailing Izuku.

Dabi's shaking, useless fingers tore the last of the blanket off of himself bringing himself to the kid's side. He looked incredibly frightened, and even Dabi's attempt to wake him up through a gentle(ish) tug of the arm resulted in a frantic and terrified squeal. Throughout all of this, his eyes remained shut, although his the shape of his iris could be seen darting around the room even through his eyelid.

Dabi had vaguely wondered before this if, or when, the kid would start getting nightmares. Frankly, he was surprised it had taken this long. Dabi's, they hadn't taken this long to appear.

However, even to Dabi—who had seen and had his fair share of nightmares—this was a bit intense. The only time Dabi had seen someone react even close to this fiercely was when they were having a really, really bad nightmare, and even then—

He heard Izuku make a small squeaky noise that sounded painfully like a cry for his mom, and that was the final straw.

Dabi shook him none too gently, barely even able to refrain from slapping him awake from the building panic rising inside of him. Somehow, it did nothing; Izuku continued lashing out and crying. Was it something more than a dream? Was he in, like, a coma, or something? And if he was, oh god if something really awful was wrong, they wouldn't be able to seek professional medical attention. Not without revealing his name, or Dabi's, or _anything_.

If the kid got hurt, _ever_ , they would be royally and fully fucked.

He shook the kid's small frame with a brand new sense of fear, possibly(but hopefully not) giving Izuku bruises with his strong grip.

"Wake up kid, please, _please_ just wake up,"

He had to remove his left and dominant hand from the kid and shake it for a second to avoid actually burning him with how hot it was getting, but he continued harshly prodding him with his right side to make up for it, but it just wasn't _working_—

Finally, _finally_ his eyes opened, and the screaming ceased as he stopped squirming all at once, almost unnaturally so.

His breathing audibly shallowed as his eyes fluttered open, looking startled and a bit confused, but otherwise fine. Like, completely fine. Like, 'why did you wake me up, I was dreaming of sugarplums, santa and god the father, son, and holy spirit?' kind of fine.

What the fuck?

"Dabi-what's going on, is everything okay…?" he asked sleepily while rubbing at his eyes. He didn't look the least bit shaken up or even phased like Dabi expected a kid would with what he assumed was a nightmare like that.

What the fuck ?

"The hell you mean 'is everything okay'!?" And okay maybe he was just overreacting a _tad_ bit (and he really should get a hold on his swearing _better_), but it wasn't like it was unjustified! Izuku was losing it like he was literally actively on _fire_ ,(Dabi prayed that he didn't somehow accidentally fulfill that metaphor) and now he was just, 100% a-ok and Dabi was the one acting out?? No sir-fucking-ree.

Izuku looked even more confused, and a little frightened, when he meekly replied,

"...What do you mean—" he stopped rubbing his eyes as they widened with something akin to realization, and his posture changed to a more shameful one.

Dabi waited for an explanation as he calmed himself down, still shaken up from his own dream and heart still beating out of his chest.

'You can calm down now you fucking moron, it's fine now, everything's fine, you're fine, chill out.' he reminded himself stiffly, focusing back on the kid.

"I….I get, uh, night terrors….sometimes…?" he asked feebly as if it was a question, playing with his hands again and looking away. He looked ashamed, so Dabi didn't push him (even though he sorta wanted to).

"Oh...you..?" he squeaked quietly. Dabi answered the implied question:

"No. I've never heard of a night terror. Mind, uh, filling me in?" he grilled softly, leaving it very open for a 'maybe later' or flat out no.

Kid did a quiet gulp, focusing on his entangled hands, and carried on.

"They're kinda like nightmares...but I don't remember them when I wake up. I had them a lot, you know, b-before…"

He hiccuped at the end and—oh christ now he's crying,

"H-hey, don't worry about it, it's okay—" he comforted awkwardly, his posture deflating at last.

Wrong choice of words apparently, because he was sobbing now fuckfuckfuck—

Dabi wrapped his arms around him like he'd done countless times before, and the kid, although rather hesitant at first, welcomed it wholly. He rested his chin on the kids' quivering head, and sighed deeply.

"I'm s-sorry for waking you up…" Izuku sniveled miserably into Dabi's chest.

Another, deeper sigh.

"Don't be. I shouldn't have gotten so angry at you, I was..."

He fished for a word—

"...worried?" the kid supplied easily.

Dabi's breath hitched for whatever fucking reason, but he covered it with another deep breath.

"Yeah...Yeah, I guess, yeah." not the word choice Dabi would have used. 'On edge' or 'terrified' would have done the job, but. But yeah, worried. It worked too, he guessed.

They waited for an untraceable amount of time on their couch-bed for Izuku to rile back down whilst Dabi's stupid-ass brain was still deciding if there was danger or not.

"You don't have to be embarrassed or anything either. It's, kid, it's nothing to be embarrassed about, even a little bit," he tried quietly into Izuku's weirdly greasy hair (didn't he shower, like, yesterday?).

He responded with a wince and a mumbled, but very sad and genuine apology.

Dabi responded to that with a long and drawn-out groan.

"Kid oh my god would you stop that already, christ, why are you even sorry?"

He nuzzled further into Dabi's shirt and sniffled a bit. Despite himself, Dabi chuckled airily.

"We're going to have to work on that then,"

Silence.

"And don't say sorry to that. It's fine, and it doesn't bother me but—okay it does, but I'm not angry at you or anything. Look, alright kid; what I'm trying to say is you shouldn't apologize for things that aren't your fault. Apologizing is important and all, but you don't have to be sorry for any slight inconvenience you cause to another person. It makes you seem small and insignificant; like you're less worthy than they are to be there, be human, and you're not. Frankly, I think that you're probably more worthy than most people. So please Izuku, for the absolute _love of god ,_ don't say sorry for having night-terrors when you're the last person on the list to be blamed." Dabi lectured sternly, but kindly even still.

Izuku didn't respond at first, but it didn't take long for him to hunch over even further, arms tightening around Dabi as he shook and sniveled against him once again.

Somehow, however, it didn't make Dabi feel worried, or troubled, or even sad. He felt contented.

Dabi rubbed soothing circles into the child's back as he hummed words of comfort into his hair-obscured ear, mouth upturned slightly.

This was progress. This was progress, and they were going to get better.

* * *


	8. The Start of Something VIII

**NOTE: ****Now THIS chapter will be the humor one. It'll most likely be done mostly by catrabit (she's so good at the funny parts((not really))((yes you are don't undersell yourself)) but I'm hoping that you guys appreciate the small angst break. The real plot is going to be starting up sort of soon, so we're getting the last of this fun stuff in before shit hits the fan.**

* * *

Opposed to what one might assume, the rest of the morning had gone pretty smoothly; at least in comparison the how it had begun.

Breakfast had been served in all of its glory as shittily warmed up leftovers, as per usual, and they had eaten quietly together on the pull-over.

"Saw a good-looking sofa-couch-chair-thingy over at Dagobah beach a while back. Decent condition too, not even that dirty; probably hasn't even sat there for that long. I can take you there to check it out tomorrow, or even today soonish, if you're feeling up to it," Dabi asked through a mouthful of noodles that were surprisingly good, even after being left uneaten all night and warmed up in the most primitive way possible (his Quirk). He chalked it up to a mixture of the takeout place actually being okay, and his potent hunger.

Izuku shrugged mid-chew,

"Mmughhh, maybeh tomurah?" he answered through a mouthful of food. He too seemed to be enjoying said crappy meal far too much, so making sure the kid was eating well was just something he'd have to watch more closely. Maybe he could buy some healthy ol' nature energy protein granola bars from a supermarket for them to snack on. Anything was possible, now that he actually had a job.

Speaking of said job, that was in—Dabi checked his phone—about an hour now. Izuku's night-terror had actually woken Dabi up around the time he was going to get up anyway (which Izuku had frowned at, saying that that wasn't normal for them to happen at that time), so no harm done in the sleep department. Not that Dabi particularly cared anyway, but it was nice having a good nights' rest when he had to work again. And again. Fuck, he had work almost every day. For a really long time. That was how work, uh worked. This was going to suck.

Dabi's first day hadn't been too bad, all things considered. One of the managers had shown him around and introduced him and yada yada. It was mostly unnecessary because he'd been required to read the place's handbook in advance to even be considered, but whatever. He'd gotten exhausted enough anyway from just meeting new people in general, something he hadn't done in such large quantities in a very, very long time. Or ever. Probably ever. Another paper in the literal room full of file cabinets marked 'things you should probably try and fix but realistically never will' his life was becoming.

Overall, the job was shit, but it was shit Dabi was almost sure he could handle. Plus, whenever he had even the slightest will to quit, all he'd have to do is think of Izuku and he'd be back at it in no time, easy peasy.

If only it could actually be that easy.

Dabi grabbed the kid's plate and stacked it over his own to 'clear' them in their bathroom/washroom/washing machine/kitchen/storing area. He tried to tell himself that he'd take care of washing them when his shift was over, but he knew he would be lying to himself. If he had been tired yesterday, he was going to be absolutely _wiped_ doing real work.

"Hey, Izuku, mind washing the dishes while I'm gone?" Dabi called from across the room.

"Hmm? Oh yeah, sure," came Izuku's slightly delayed reply.

Dabi went about getting his stuff together to prepare for work. His formal apron was kept at the workplace to prevent him from losing it or stealing it or something, so there truly wasn't much in the prep-work. A thought came to his mind as he was brushing his mop of dark hair to look less thug-like,

"Oh, by the way, how'd you manage yesterday?" he turned his head towards the kid's general direction, regarding him, even though his back was turned away.

"Fine, I guess."

Well that was a pretty dry answer for as big of a deal as it allegedly was.

"Better question, _what'd_ you manage? Assuming you didn't sleep it through." he teased lightly.

Izuku took a second, and came back with,

"I just read and drew is all, why?"

He sounded peeved and...defensive, almost. To what, Dabi couldn't piece together. He didn't think he'd sounded rude or invasive or pesky when he'd asked at all. Dabi shrugged it off; probably just the beginning of teenagerisms coming around. He wasn't looking forward to edgy, rebellious, 'it's not a phase' Izuku in the slightest, but he'd deal. Dabi loved the brat too much not to.

…..that sounded so weird to say out loud, or think out loud or—whatever! It sounded weird. Not necessarily in a bad way but just, just weird. Hmm.

"Alright, well I'm going to head out now, take care." _Wow now Dabi was starting to sound like a mom; what the fuck._

"Don't uh, like burn the place down please?" _And that sounded like an insult, didn't it? What the fuck was he doing? _

Dabi cringed a little at his words and Izuku just gave him a look that just said 'please go already', so he did just that. Shutting the door he skirted through hallways, up abandoned staircases, and back into the public.

A quick ten minutes or so had Dabi standing in front of one of the most cliche and cringe-worthy item on the block. The green and white logo practically mocked him, so Dabi accordingly flipped it off with both hands in a double-bird.

Star-fucking-bucks.

He lets out a sigh that was worthy of being documented as a soundtrack in a sitcom, and promptly made his way towards the back door. He ran into another nameless co-worker on his way and they go in together, not sparing any pleasantries. Evidently, he wasn't the only one working there who didn't like to go through the hell of socializing; especially since his shift up ahead would be full of it.

Hanging up his coat and tying his apron around his waist, he mentally prepared for a long day of suffering.

Since he was a newer employee and had never worked an espresso machine, he was on the register full time. That meant he dealt with customers all day, with very, very few hiatuses. Fun. The worst part was that his very _first break_ was three fucking hours away, and he had no escape from talking to people who don't know the definition of an easy order with no foreseeable leisure time in the near future.

Sure, he was briefed and told to memorize the menu to make checking people out easy, but why the fuck does someone need to order a 'skinny vanilla latte with 35 pumps of caramel sauce plus matcha and whipped cream'? Do they have any idea how long it takes to ring up all that shit via a tablet with lettering so small he would accidentally delete entire orders through a single slightly misplaced tap? What the fuck is that person's everyday life if their _coffee_ order is that complicated? All completely valid questions that Dabi fretted he would never have the answers to.

Getting his mind back on track, Dabi clocked in and replaced the girl who was previously at the register, ending her morning shift. She looked like she hadn't gotten sleep for three days, and if he was being totally honest, she probably hadn't. Even through the dark complexion of her skin and what was likely several layers of makeup, her heavy bags stood out like black on white.

As she passed him—looking already quite zombie-like—her half-lidded eyes met his for a moment, but their message was read loud and clear; 'get out while you still can'.

And so forth began the eight words that would haunt him for the next however long it took him to get fired, and maybe even to his grave.

"Welcome to Starbucks, may I take your order?"

* * *

When it was close to the time of his long-awaited first break many agonizing hours later, Dabi was ready to lay down on the dirty, sticky floor and fall asleep right then and there. He wasn't even half-way done yet, and his legs were already sore just from standing for so long, his brain already running on reserves from having to remember and record so, so many orders.

It was in this stage of just counting down the seconds until he could just sit in a chair and nap for a bit, when one of the higher-ups on the coffee hierarchy approached him. Despite the drained mood that seemed to emanate from every employee in the building, this guy seemed completely unaffected with a spring in his step and a real, but annoyingly large, smile on his face.

"Ey yo! New kid!" Dabi cocked his head to pay further heed to the guy. He'd introduced himself earlier on in the day, but Dabi had entirely forgotten his name; probably because his brain was trying to clear space to keep the orders somewhere. He looked like a Chad though.

At the acknowledgment, the dude only seemed to glow more, bothering Dabi further. Yep, definitely a Chad.

"Yeah, you! There's a much-needed cleanup in the bathroom, can you take care of it before you go on break? Restock the soap while you're in there." he ordered as he turned to leave before Dabi could so much as mutter a word of enraged protest.

Dabi physically refrained from screaming, and prayed to all that was holy that he would ask someone else while he finished up this customer.

To add to his list of suffering, the customer he was dealing with had been deciding if they should get their friend a cake-pop or a brownie for far too long along with two already fixed coffees starting to get cold. And yeah, Dabi had wanted to tell them to kindly screw off because if they had wanted to get something along with their drink, they should have said so before, but his polite inclinations had no effect.

He was about to throw the register at them before they decided to not get any side-dessert, or coffee for their friend, at all. That's just a dick move. Who the hell does that? Who the hell enters a Starbucks to get their friend a motherfucking drink, waits in a twenty-minute longass line, takes five solid minutes to decide on said drink, orders, takes five more minutes to sneak in dessert, and then cancels half the order at the very last second? Have they no honor? No shame? No decency?

'Fuck you' Dabi mumbles lowly under his breath once his back is turned to the probably twelve or thirteen-year-old little girl as he tosses the perfectly good drink away. Age didn't matter in such things, _such atrocities_.

After ringing up the asshole in the My Little Pony shirt with a hissed, 'have a good day', he nodded at another worker to take his place and started a slow gait to the cleaning closet in the back. After getting the needed supplies and a pair of gloves and a face mask, he made his way to the bathroom and mentally prepared to block out the images of what he would inevitably have to clean up.

After nearly throwing up (twice), he put back the supplies with a shiver, washed his hands raw (even though he was wearing gloves), went to take his break, and grabbed a day-old pastry on his way out.

_I wonder how Midoriya is doing._ He thought as he finished up the final godly bites of his muffin. _Maybe he's drawing or some shit. Or crying. Hopefully, he's not crying. _

Dabi became suddenly pensive as he reminded himself that the brat truly was all alone back at home, nobody to comfort him and tell him that it was okay to cry, don't worry about it, okay? There's nothing wrong with you. He'd never even been told what the kid did to keep himself occupied, and he knew there was more to it than just 'drawing and reading'.

_I really hope he's okay by himself. _

He chucked his muffin wrapper at the trash bin and missed. Sighing, he went out back and leaned on the back entrance to get some fresh air.

After lazing about for the majority of his 45 minute-long break, relishing in the glorious sensation of being able to sit, he went back inside to continue his work among the satan spawns of the underworld he had to serve coffee to.

One thing Dabi actually did enjoy about this job though, was serving all the thots in highschool ordering their 90-syllable-long drinks to post on snapchat or some shit, and putting the receipt sticker directly on the logo of the cup. Seeing their aghast face that someone would dare mess up their instagram post was honestly the best part of working the register, but Dabi supposed it was the little things in life that mattered the most.

It was nearing fifteen minutes left of work when a middle-aged lady, around in her 30's, met the front of the line. There were two little boys who both appeared to be the same age or maybe a little bit younger than Izuku clinging to the pant-legs of the woman, who Dabi assumed was their mother.

Her order was prestigious, as most drinks usually were. Obviously, explaining to her that they didn't have one and a half percent milk fat on the premises was a hassle, but it otherwise went fine.

That is, it went fine up until she came back.

The lady, whom's name Dabi had already forgotten, was cutting the whole line; entirely oblivious to the disgruntled stares and mutters of disbelief.

"Excuse me—excuse me!" she shoved her orange-painted nails into Dabi's face to get his attention from the customer he was currently in the process of serving. Her two children behind her were now shoving one another, bothering the customers even further.

"Uh, ma'am, if you need something you're going to want to talk to someone who isn't—"

"Thank you, it will just be _one_ second," she butted in, her arms now on her hips.

"So," she cleared her throat, and Dabi shared a glance of shock with the poor customer he'd been in a conversation with,

"I'll make sure to make this very quick, I have a PTA meeting to get to and it's very important that I'm not late. I _have_ to be a role model,"

"Anyway, I ordered a 'Triple, Venti, Half Sweet, Non-Fat, Caramel Macchiato', and it has_ far less_ sugar than the last time I visited this establishment,"

Dabi wasn't exactly sure if he was hearing her right, and didn't really have a coherent response right away,

"...Sorry, but what exactly is it that you want?" he asked lowly, almost gaping at her.

"I want a refund for the trouble that this entire situation is putting me through! This ordeal might even cost me my punctuation, so I'm trying to come to an understanding with you…" she squinted down at Dabi's chest, presumably at his name-tag.

Her face went comically confused, and then judgemental. She had his name on her lips, but dissed the idea at the last second, mumbling something under her breath. Fucking _bitch_.

Dabi managed to gather himself and rein in his urge to fire off obscenities before he asked through his teeth,

"Don't you have those sugar packets at your table? If not, we can give you—"

The lady interrupted Dabi yet again with an exasperated huff. As if she had any right to be exasperated in this situation.

The line was justifiably getting outraged by her unbelievable antics, and her kids were making grabs at the tip jar. Dabi pulled it out of their reach,

"It tastes artificial when it's added in afterward. I thought you would know this, being a trained employee, but I guess anybody gets these jobs nowadays."

She had the nerve to sigh, before jeering back at him.

"Actually, I have had enough of this. I would like to speak to the manager please,"

A collective groan of disprovable and outrage came from the other people waiting; some of them were even out-right shouting at her. Whether she was flat out ignoring or them or had third-degree hearing loss from the direct blockage of horse-shit in her ears, Dabi would never know.

"Ma'am," he hissed,

"I really don't think—"

"I _demand_ to speak to the manager right this instant! You have already wasted enough of my time, and I am going to be late to my PTA meeting!" she all but whined back.

Fuck it, he might as well rope somebody else into this ridiculous situation.

Dabi flagged Chad over, who was already looking like he was about to intervene anyway.

He met the situation with a plastered smile and a bounce to his step.

"What seems to be the problem?"

"The problem," she heaved, bewildered as to how he didn't have to ability to read her mind, "Is that my Triple, Venti, Half Sweet, Non-Fat, Caramel Macchiato lacks sugar, and this, this child, refuses to give me the refund that I deserve!"

Dabi's hands were shaking under the counter, clenched and pissed. The stress and absurdity of the situation was enough for his Quirks' reflexes to start up, but he shoved it down.

Chad seemed to be good at reading the situation, and it looked like he could tell that there would be no reasoning with this woman. He kept up his personality, and replied,

"Sure thing! Give me just a moment!" he went into the cash register and took out the money for the drink. He had the money in cash offered in one hand, and his other was outstretched to take back the drink,

"Oh nononoNO, I'm still going to drink this! We can't have you wasting food, now, can we?"

There were times in life when Dabi had to remind himself that homicide was illegal and therefore not publicly acceptable, and this was certainly one of them.

Chad's eyes twitched slightly and he took his arm back from where she was trying to take the money.

"Ma'am, I'm sorry, but for a refund to work, you have to exchange the purchase for the money,"

Her anger was clear now as she seemed to nearly be shaking with rage. Meanwhile, Chad was looking more and more uncomfortable, his smile becoming obviously forced.

"First, you don't allow me a refund, and second, you insult me?! You know, I wasn't going to say anything, but this employee you have here should really cover up, cover up those things he has all over his face and arms! They are frankly disgusting, and there are children here!"

Dabi's face went involuntarily red with shock, rage, and a bit of shame. Chad's reaction was similar, because although the man was a bit odd, he at least had the decency to recognize how out of line the statement was.

"Miss, I think we're going to have to ask you to leave the building now." he said with his brows furrowed and arms crossed.

"This is absolutely unbelievable!" her voice pitched so high that Dabi winced. His hands itched to let off a flame.

"I will have you know that I will be telling everybody at the PTA meeting about this! You will lose such a large percentage of your service that—"

"Please miss, don't make me call the police. You are causing a public disturbance." Chad deadpanned, no longer even trying to seem friendly.

She made a strange 'humph' noise in her entitled anger, grabbed her kids by the backs of their shirts, and stomped her way out of the building.

"Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out," Dabi said under his breath darkly.

A sound of collective relief and cheer washed over the building, sharing his bliss at the woman finally being gone, and in mere moments everybody was back to their usual chatter.

Chad simply took a ten from the money he still had out from the lady's rampage, pressed it into Dabi's very overheated hand, and gestured him away with a quiet, 'you're excused'.

Dabi saluted him for his taming of the beast (in his head of course) and promptly got the fuck out of there.

'Some people' Dabi thought as he made his way back to Izuku.

'Some fucking people'.

Izuku would definitely get a kick out of this.

* * *

**Sorry, after this, I'm afraid it will take longer than before. I lost my phone a week ago, someone took it from me when I was with my friends. So right now, I need to focus to save money for buy a new one. But I promise you, I will be back.****_Stay safe, stay healthy and have a good day everyone! Please wait for me!_**


	9. The Start of Something IX

As soon as Dabi left the room, Izuku released an airy breath of relief that he'd been holding ever since their early morning conversation.

It had been an in-the-moment decision, not telling Dabi about his new training regimen, and he was only vaguely sure why he was keeping it from him in the first place. He simply hadn't liked the idea of saying that he'd been working out. For some reason.

Whatever the cause was, it was making him feel jittery and tingly. He wanted nothing more at the moment than to jump up and down and shout, but he was also so sore that his limbs would protest from the strain. They were already heavy and leadlike; rubbing circles into the painful areas was only a small solace to the aching.

Even still, the desire to be moving was as active as a beehive in his brain. Motivation playing at his very fingertips.

Izuku thought that this was probably because he was excited to get back to training so that he could get big and strong, but he knew there was more to it.

He knew where the guilt was coming from.

Izuku had never lied to Dabi before.

Not completely, and not about something this important. White lies, somehow, were even less common with Dabi than with his Mom. He'd never been able to actually lie to her, especially after she started being so, so nice to him and Izuku was beginning to become sharp enough to really see it.

Small, insignificant lies, however, lined almost every one of their conversations. If he told his mom how he was actually doing, and when he'd gone to bed, she would have been too worried.

He already felt bad enough, she was trying so hard and was being so caring and Izuku was just, Izuku, and he knew that she deserved better. It wasn't fair to her to have to be stuck with him. She wasn't like his schoolmates, she couldn't leave no matter what.

That being said, Izuku was realizing now that although he never kept anything important from his mom, he never gave her the full truth.

Lies that Izuku felt that were fairly small spread from ones he deemed necessary, to completely unneeded fibs that he peppered in.

She'd ask him what he'd eaten for lunch, and he'd tell her he ate something he didn't.

She'd question where he put his markers, and he'd say he didn't know, even when he did.

He wasn't sure where these lies had come from or why he'd made them, but they were constant and equally harmless. Maybe if he hadn't have lied so much, things would have been different. If he'd been, y'know, better, then she'd be with him.

The pit in his chest thrummed.

Izuku rubbed his eyes. There were no tears, but it helped, somehow.

Anyway, yeah, Izuku found that he almost never lied to Dabi about anything. Which he didn't understand, because it wasn't like he trusted him more than he'd trusted his mom, right?

…..Right?

No, Izuku didn't think so. He knew that he really did trust Dabi but he'd only known him for—well Izuku didn't know how long it had been, but he'd (obviously) known his mom his entire life. She, she was his _mom_. Nothing could ever come closer than that, and Izuku knew that Dabi was trying really hard and he appreciated it so much but—

But he wasn't Izuku's Mom.

Nobody ever would be again.

Dabi met different marks though. Everything seemed to be open between them, and Dabi made Izuku feel safe. Which was also weird, because never in Izuku's life had he been less safe than he was now, but the comfort still stayed. It was probably due to Dabi's Quirk, which gave off a very strong and fierce aura, while at the same time warm and protective. What else could it be?

Izuku was Quirkless, so he'd never been able to defend himself. His mother's moral support was comforting, but it had never been there to physically protect him from his classmates and their shoves and kicks. Dabi was strong though, and Izuku knew that he would never let anybody lay a finger on him.

Hah, of course right when Izuku stopped attending school was when he actually had the protection he'd always craved, the brother he'd always needed—

Wait….

Brother?

Izuku mentally backtracked, stopping his hands from the fidgeting he didn't even know he was doing.

He...yeah, Dabi kinda was Izuku's brother. Not actually, they weren't _really_ related, but it somehow mattered less than he'd thought it would. This entire time, Izuku had been trying to compare Dabi to his Mom. That...that was impossible, that was obviously impossible but—but 'brother' fit surprisingly well. It felt right.

Izuku's face heated involuntarily. He'd never actually be able to call Dabi his brother though, _duh_. Even the thought of referring to Dabi as such a word made Izuku become flustered and sheepish. The label would stay in Izuku's mind to make things less confusing for himself, but he never had to usher it out loud. That would be dumb.

A quick head shake did well to rid his nerves from imagining embarrassing scenarios where Izuku called Dabi brother, as he got himself back on track.

Okay, what had he been thinking about again? Lying? Yes. Lying. That was what had started his dive into labels.

The topic change turned his blushing into the previous jitteries as his legs kicked back and forth at the edge of the couch.

He'd always been one to stick closely to the rules (his mother said they were there for a reason) but now he was starting to grasp why kids like Kacchan always seemed to be okay with—or even _enjoy_—breaking them.

Izuku wondered if he should start his daily top-secret workout now or wait till later. He shrugged a bit to himself (it wasn't like he had anything better to do) and decided to get started, pulling his regimen out from between sketchbook pages where he'd stashed it.

Dabi didn't seem to notice, or at least remark, on the furniture being moved, so he shoved over the coffee table a bit and went to work.

Izuku began with pushups, his arms being somehow the least sore of his limbs. His initial plan had been to do 30, but after two segments of five he was already shaking like a leaf, and had to break his small segments into even smaller ones.

Frustrated that he couldn't even get a third of the way through his goal, he pressed forward onto sit-ups, which were equally, if not _more_ hard, which only made Izuku's irritation and disappointment grow. Moving on to the easier sets, such as squats and jumping jacks, Izuku decided that maybe he'd set his goals too high. The soreness was really killing him, making his muscles strain to tense and untense. He also needed to find a way to get his legs in shape, because the few times he'd run around the room definitely hadn't been enough judging by the lack of tenderness.

Izuku trained his eyes on the opening leading off to the opening off the subway. Maybe…..

No—Izuku couldn't do that. Dabi had been very, very clear about the rules so far, and although it was a bit hypocritical to be a rule-following advocate when he was literally in the process of breaking rules, leaving the subway felt too extreme.

It had gone terribly last time, and that was months ago now (probably). Izuku wasn't stupid; he saw that Dabi had looked really sad and scared. He'd also been looking for him outside in the night air for a while, since Izuku felt him shaking lightly against him when they hugged (weird, since he thought Dabi had told him he couldn't get cold).

He didn't want to see Dabi, someone who seemed unbreakable and courageous, afraid like that again. Didn't want someone to hurt just because they cared about him (which always, always happened). It stung to even remember, so doing it again was a bad idea.

Plus, they trusted each other. Or, at least, Izuku trusted Dabi. Breaking that trust was definitely was a step too far, no matter how much Izuku craved to do some long-distance running.

He settled for running around the room until his upper legs and, weirdly, shoulders, started protesting at the strain, and he took a sit down on the floor, tasting salt in his mouth.

Working out proved to be easier written than done, just barely finishing 15 sit ups, thighs now throbbing after only 25 squats, he had to sit down before going into his second round of jumping jacks. He checked his clock; still another hour until Dabi got back. Izuku groaned.

These were supposed to be easy, simple exercises and he was barely going through the motions, already completely spent. He wanted to go outside, because that could certainly solve some of his issues, give him some fresh air at least and Dabi would never actually need to know as long as he got back in time—But no, no. Bad idea, remember? It wasn't worth it. He had to keep that in mind.

Izuku tried to ignore the voice in his head telling him that he needed to continue, that he needed to get stronger so that he didn't have to be weak and useless anymore. The voice sounded suspiciously like Kacchan, and hit just as hard. The accusations had a tough bite laced inside them, and minutes later they had Izuku thunking down on the bed like an ikea bag full of bones, no more motivation, only the pull of gravity weighing him down.

"'m sure I'll wake up n'clean up b'fore Dabi gets home," was the last thing he slurred out before his eyelids closed and he knew no more.

* * *

Dabi saluted to the grocery store clerk sarcastically as he waltzed his way out of the store, adjusting the reusable bag he'd bought so that it rested on his shoulder (save the turtles, or whatever). The generous wad of yen Chad had pressed into his hand after dealing with the devil herself had been put to good use, and Dabi had decided to put it towards healthy food that wasn't takeout for once. A real shocker, he knew, but it definitely wasn't responsible parenting (fuck, still weird) pumping your kid full of chemicals and chips.

He hadn't really planned ahead upon entering the place though, so he'd left with a bag of those baby carrots, snap peas, and grapes. And, of course, no way to store any of them. Fuck.

Whatever, he could just stuff Izuku full of nutrients right away. If they could both finish them in one or two days, it'd probably be fine (unless the grapes magically turned into wine overnight, which sounded crazy, but what did Dabi know about the fine art of alcohol?).

Dabi had also taken his time out to restock on paper towels and toilet paper, which jesus christ went by fast.

Next big item on the ever growing list: minifridge. If possible, one that magically ran on batteries. Oh, and while he was at it, make it teleport into the subway station right under the Christmas tree next to the winning lottery ticket and puppy. The world owed him and the kid that much and more.

He caught a quick glance at himself as he passed by a storefront window, before looking away and unconsciously ghosting his hand over his light pink skin. The words of the Karen rang fresh in his mind, and even though the last thing he should be doing is getting moody about what some idiot has to say about him—

_You know, I wasn't going to say anything, but this employee you have here should really cover up, cover up those things he has all over his face and arms!_Yeah, he couldn't help it. Shit stung.

He's actually able to...forget, about how he looks for a while, when he's with Izuku. Back at the place he grew up in, that was an impossible feat. There were daily reminders of his mistake, may it be through sparring, harsh jabs, or disgusted glares.

Izuku gave him none of that.

He had no judgment or prejudice against him for it, not even an ounce of pity since the lie Dabi had spun. He knew the kid's reaction would likely change if he knew the whole story (he would definitely think less of him then), but when it came down to it, Izuku was a light in the dark. A positive in his long history of negatives. Dabi had dug the hole too deep now. He didn't know what he would do if something happened to the little shit.

He didn't want to think about it.

There was also something else Dabi had seen when he looked at his reflection, something besides old memories and pain.

And call him stupid for having such a thing pop up into his head but Dabi...actually looked like an adult, with his grocery bag and turtle-neck. Given, he wasn't one yet, but—

Wait. Actually—Dabi glanced at his phone. It was October 7th. His birthday had been over a month ago. Dabi, he was eighteen now. A full fledged legal adult. Not that being legal had ever stopped him before _but damn_, that felt weird. Didn't really change anything at all, but just the symbolization of what it meant, the title, was strange.

An adult.

It both fit too well and not at all. He hadn't felt like a kid for a while, but he definitely didn't feel like he had the responsibility and maturity that being an adult required. Not even close.

Whatever, doesn't really matter anyway, so there's no reason to dwell. Plus, Dabi had surpassed the social time limit for how long you're supposed to stare at yourself in the reflection for anyway. He went on his way after readjusting the straps again, and made it back in record time, even with the food stop.

"Kid, you would not _believe_ the day I've had," Walking through their 'front door' Dabi expected Izuku to be idling around, drawing, or fiddling with something, but what he didn't expect was to see the kid passed out face first on their futon. He should have expected it, with how early they'd gotten up earlier, but somehow he hadn't. Hm.

He paused for a second, a little worried because there is no way that position was comfortable, and shuffled over after setting down the groceries.

"Hey, I'm back. Don't go peacing out on me, you gotta eat bud,"

Dabi's concern grew after he nudged him and he still didn't even get a mumble. Luckily, jostling his shoulder a little more harshly did the trick. Izuku rolled over, grumbling low protests of being woken up, and buried his head deeper into the couch stubbornly.

Not a moment later though, he practically reeled as he sat up abruptly and blinked at Dabi through his sleepiness, eyes wide despite the sheen of coming into consciousness.

Dabi put his arms up in mock surrender, reasonably a little alarmed.

The kid murmured a mix between a 'huh' and an 'ah', sounding startled and surprised of all things, before sitting up completely and rubbing at his eye with the palm of his hand.

"Sorry, didn't realize you'd be home so soon..." Tiredness shone through his voice when he mumbled his excuse, and Dabi felt guilt taking over his growing suspicion.

He wished he could let him go to bed early and sleep in till noon (at the very least the kid deserved proper rest), but he had to eat throughout the day. And, sadly, one needed to be awake to eat, and they couldn't afford him taking fewer hours to get back earlier.

They needed the money, every scrap of it, if they wanted to keep on at it the way that they were. Even so, their current position was hardly sustainable. They couldn't live in the subway forever.

But that was another worry for another day.

Dabi raised an eyebrow, "It's about that time, yeah," he sauntered back into the area dubbed their kitchen and unpacked the food, "Speaking of, I got some actual food but we gotta eat it before it goes bad, so come on let's chow down."

Izuku hummed in acknowledgment as Dabi grabbed two disposable plates and spread a decent amount of the produce on them, finishing them off with a granola bar each (for the record, Dabi didn't like granola bars, but he could deal in the name of setting a good example).

He, however, couldn't _stand_ it when grapes got all soft when thawed and didn't have any surface tension, so he figured they could eat those first. He put a plentiful heaping of them that took up most of the space, green and purple alike.

After grabbing the bag he went to go serve them on the coffee table, and saw it was shoved off to the side. He shot Izuku a questioning look but he quickly looked away. Shrugging, he pushed it back and set the fruit and veggie trays out.

Izuku didn't seem bothered by the lack of comfort food and grabbed handfuls of the grapes, promptly and ungracefully shoving them into his mouth with a muffled thank you through his chewing. If Fuyumi was there, Izuku would certainly be getting an earful for 'eating like a chipmunk'. Natsuo might've laughed.

He wondered what they would think if they saw him now. What they would say.

Would they be Proud? Disappointed? Surprised? Definitely surprised. Who would expect him, of all people, to adopt a kid off the streets?

He definitely didn't.

He wondered what his mother would have thought if she knew what he was doing.

He wondered what his father would say.

Dabi swallowed his reminiscence down with chewed up grapes. It was too late for this shit. He bit the middle of a carrot loudly, and tasked himself with crunching it in his mouth until it lost its sound.

Between the two of them, they finished half the bag of grapes before Dabi decided they might want to save some and swapped the remaining berries out for more carrots. Looking around the room, spacial awareness and usual routine told him that a couple of the other pieces of furniture they had was a little misplaced. Only slightly, but noticeable in the blotches devoid of dust on the floor.

"Hey kid, did you decide we needed to reorganize the room or something?" he commented after swallowing a bite of granola.

Izuku tensed up and looked away quickly, "w-well, no. Um. I just, well, wanted a bit more room?" That made Dabi even more confused as he set down his health bar.

Seeing as Izuku wasn't going to elaborate, Dabi leaned forward slightly from his position of sitting next to Izuku to see his face better. "More room for what?"

"Nothing! It's fine now, forget about it." Well, that was reassuring. Dabi wasn't sure what but Izuku was definitely keeping _something_ from him. He had no idea what it had to do with moving furniture, but Dabi knew better than to be an ass and try to pry it from him. Izuku was beginning to trust him more and more, so he wasn't about to run it by hounding him until he confessed. That would just be rude.

"Uh, sure," he said carefully, turning his head away and leaving back into the couch. He kept his gaze of Izuku through the corner of his eye, "If something's up, don't be afraid to tell me okay? I won't judge, unless it's like, really weird, but I'm sure we can work around whatever it is. I got your back,"

Izuku finally made eye contact, and Dabi thought he saw something like guilt before it was concealed by a small smile. "Yeah, of course. Thanks Dabi."


End file.
